A 

FLORENTINE 
REVERY 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

HEW  YORK    •    BOSTON   •     CHICAGO   •    DALLAS 
ATLANTA  •    SAN  FRANCISCO 

MACMILLAN  &  CO.,  LIMITED 

LONDON  •    BOMBAY  •    CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNE 

THE  MACMILLAN  CO.  OP  CANADA,  LTD; 

TORONTO 


FIRST  CLOISTER,  FLORENCE  SAN  MARCO 


A 
Florentine  Revery 


BY 

H.   H.   Powers 

President  of  The  Bureau  of  University  Travel 


THE   MACMILLAN   COMPANY 
1922 

All  rights  reserved 


PRINTED  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES  OF  AMERICA 


COPYRIGHT,  1922. 
BY  THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY. 


Set  up  and  electrotyped.  Published  December,  1922. 


FERRIS  PRINTING  COMPANY 
NEW  YORK 


Stack 
Annex 

5 

035 


The  following  pages  lay  no  claim  to  the  character 
of  exact  history.  The  aim  has  been  to  give  pictorial 
expression  to  certain  significant  phases  and  promi- 
nent personalities  in  the  life  of  a  famous  city.  The 
dates  here  assumed  are  more  or  less  arbitrary  and 
the  sequence  of  events  somewhat  simplified.  In  the 
interest  of  pictorial  completeness  conjecture  has 
been  freely  admitted  to  fill  the  inevitable  void  of 
the  historic  record.  All  this,  it  is  hoped,  is  consistent 
with  that  essential  truth  which,  if  respected,  may 
legitimately  be  clothed  in  such  historic  accidents_as 
we  will. 


1S24458 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 

From  the  visitor's  seat  on  the  ramparts  of  old 
Fiesole  the  traveler  looks  out  upon  one  of  the  most 
suggestive  scenes  in  Italy.  Around  him  are  the 
relics  of  the  much  metamorphosed  ancient  Etruscan 
city.  Here  are  still  the  huge  stones  that  were  moss 
grown  when  the  she  wolf  was  suckling  Romulus. 
The  open  square  a  few  yards  below,  down  the  steep 
path,  is  the  ancient  forum  or  market,  adjoined  by 
the  Roman  theatre,  the  mediaevel  cathedral,  and 
the  very  modem  statues  of  Victor  Emanuel  and 
Garibaldi.  For  Fiesole  covers  well  nigh  the  whole 
span  of  history,  and  no  age  of  stirring  achievement 
has  failed  to  leave  its  memorial. 

But  it  is  not  these  nearer  surroundings  that  first 
challenge  attention.  Beyond  the  battlement  the 
eye  ranges  over  one  of  the  most  remarkable  views 
in  Europe.  It  is  not  merely  that  the  view  is  enchant- 
ing, though  this  is  indubitable.  The  view  is  unique 
in  all  Italy  if  not  in  all  Europe.  A  broad,  saucer 
shaped  depression,  perhaps  forty  miles  in  diameter, 
and  bounded  by  a  remarkably  regular  rim  of  hills 
extends  before  us,  the  whole  clothed  in  richest  ver- 
dure and  enlivened  by  flashes  from  the  gleaming 

1 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


river.  In  the  center,  huddled  close,  lies  Florence, 
its  domes  and  towers  familiar  even  to  the  stranger. 
From  a  dozen  hilltops  rise  the  crenellated  towers  of 
ancient  castles  or  petty  baronial  seats.  And  scat- 
tered far  and  wide  from  the  city's  walls  out  to  the 
very  saucer's  rim  gleam  the  white  walls  of  Tuscan 
villas,  their  sentinel  cypresses  darkly  outlined  against 
the  grey  green  of  the  olive  clad  hills. 

Our  first  impression  is  one  of  perfect  harmony. 
This  is  Italy,  the  Italy  of  our  dreams.  All  is  as  it 
should  be;  no  part  that  could  be  spared;  none  that 
would  not  miss  the  rest.  The  impression  is  not  one 
to  be  needlessly  disturbed.  The  mood  of  simple 
enjoyment  may  well  be  indulged  indefinitely.  For 
this  fusion  of  old  and  new,  this  harmonizing  of 
implacable  systems,  this  supreme  synthesis  is  the 
most  noteworthy  of  all  facts  here  suggested. 

But  sooner  or  later  this  sense  of  harmonious  unity 
gives  place  to  more  detailed  and  puzzling  impressions. 
This  is  Italy,  we  were  saying,  but  now  that  we 
reflect,  it  is  profoundly  unlike  the  Italy  that  we  have 
traversed  from  Naples  or  Brindisi  up  to  the  crest 
of  the  Apennines.  There  lies  Florence,  accessible, 
peaceful,  and  convenient,  in  the  center  of  the  beau- 
tiful valley  of  which  it  is  at  once  the  creation  and 
the  mistress.  What  more  natural?  But  recalling 
what  we  have  seen,  what  other  city  is  so  situated? 
Where  were  the  cities  that  we  passed  on  our  journey 
hither?  There  is  Cassino  which  looks  down  upon 
us  as  from  an  eagle's  nest.  There  are  Alatri  and 

2 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


Anagni  and  Palestrina,  ancient  rivals  of  Rome,  all 
perched  upon  hilltops  miles  from  the  railway  stations 
that  now  bear  their  names.  There  is  Orvieto  upon 
her  isolated  table  rock  that  falls  sheer  away  on 
every  side,  a  city  approached  by  miles  of  toilsomely 
winding  road,  or  more  conveniently  by  the  modern 
funicular  railway.  There  is  Chiusi,  the  ancient  Clu- 
sium,  where  the  mighty  Lars  Porsena  held  sway,  a 
city  so  high  and  far  away  that  the  hurried  traveler 
misses  it  altogether  and  takes  the  cluster  of  buildings 
around  the  railway  station  for  the  home  of  the 
redoubtable  chieftain.  There  are  Cortona  and  Siena, 
and  Perugia,  and  Assisi,  and  Spello,  and  Spoleto,  and 
Terni, — the  list  is  endless.  These  cities  do  not  nestle 
conveniently  in  the  valleys,  easy  of  access  and  com- 
fortable. They  crown  the  distant  hilltops,  close 
shut  within  cyclopean  walls,  infinitely  picturesque, 
but  to  the  last  degree  inconvenient,  suspicious  and 
unneighborly.  Even  Rome,  situated  in  the  midst 
of  her  broad  campagna  and  unprotected  by  her 
distant  circle  of  mountains,  is  but  a  seeming  excep- 
tion. Her  low  situation  and  comparatively  easy 
modern  grades  quite  conceal  her  ancient  topography. 
When  the  primitive  folk  who  were  attracted  here 
by  the  traffic  of  the  Tiber  located  their  scattered 
settlement  on  the  seven  hills,  these  spurs  and  frag- 
ments of  the  ancient  plateau  were  separated  by 
well  nigh  impassable  chasms  which  made  them  almost 
as  impregnable  as  Orvieto,  though  less  resistant  to 
later  levelling.  Decidedly  the  typical  Italian  city  is 

3 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


a  hill  city,  inconvienient,  inaccessible,  and  afraid. 

And  here  below  lies  Florence  in  the  midst  of  her 
smiling  valley,  her  level  plain  but  a  few  yards 
above  the  neighboring  sea,  and  not  a  hill  within  her 
ancient  limits  the  height  of  a  man's  statue.  Nature 
offers  her  not  the  slightest  protection.  Even  the 
shallow  Arno  runs  straight  past  and  refuses  to 
encircle  the  town.  Florence  was  located  with  no 
thought  of  danger  or  provision  for  defense. 

And  now  that  we  reflect,  we  are  reminded  that 
the  place  where  we  are  sitting  upon  the  stone  bench 
offers  precisely  the  advantages  which  the  Italians 
seem  everywhere  else  to  have  chosen.  A  steep  hill 
falling  away  abruptly  on  every  side,  but  with  suffi- 
cient building  space  for  a  crowded  ancient  city,  a 
higher  portion  for  the  indispensable  citadel,  and  a 
depression  or  saddle  for  the  necessary  market  place, 
it  needed  but  moderate  fortifications  of  the  ancient 
type  to  render  it  impregnable. 

It  was  an  ideal  site  for  a  city  that  should  dominate 
the  fair  plain  below.  Nay,  the  site  was  chosen  and 
the  city  that  was  built  there  did  dominate  the  plain 
for  centuries  before  the  first  tower  rose  on  the  banks 
of  the  Arno.  It  is  Fiesole  that  is  the  true  Italian 
city,  the  counterpart  of  a  hundred  others  that  from 
their  hilltops  have  watched  the  growth  and  the  crum- 
bling of  empires  for  the  last  three  thousand  years. 
It  is  Florence  that  is  the  enigma,  a  city  that  had 
scarce  its  like  in  the  whole  peninsula  until  these 
modern  times. 

4 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


But  this  is  not  the  only  thing  in  the  scene  before 
us  that  calls  for  explanation.  Where  else  in  Italy 
do  we  see  a  broad  expanse  of  valley  dotted  with 
villas  and  country  seats  as  we  do  here?  It  is  all 
so  perfectly  as  it  should  be  that  we  do  not  at  first  feel 
moved  to  question.  But  the  question  once  raised, 
we  recall  that  other  valleys  are  not  like  this.  From 
the  walls  of  Perugia  or  Siena  we  look  across  to  other 
hilltop  cities,  but  isolated  homes  are  few  in  the 
plain  below.  Farther  south  they  vanish  altogether, 
or  if  found  at  all  they  are  of  most  recent  origin. 
What  traveler  in  Italy  has  not  heard  the  query: 
"Where  do  the  people  live  who  till  these  fields  and 
tend  these  vines?"  And  the  answer  is  always  that 
they  live  up  in  the  walled  towns  on  the  distant  hill- 
tops, daily  toiling  up  and  down  to  their  work  in  the 
distant  fields  and  vineyards.  But  here  it  is  not  so. 
The  husbandman  lives  among  his  vines  and  the 
proprietor  upon  his  estate,  and  has  lived  there  for 
many  generations.  It  is  well,  but  why  here  and 
not  elsewhere? 

Our  panorama  from  high  perched  Fiesole  is  there- 
fore not  merely  beautiful  and  picturesque.  It  is 
plainly  full  of  meaning  to  those  who  reflect  upon  its 
unique  features.  The  Etruscan  walls,  the  city  on 
the  Arno,  the  towering  castles,  and  the  scattered 
villas  have  each  their  own  significance  and  stand  as 
the  expressive  symbols  of  different  epochs  of  civili- 
zation. In  their  day  they  have  been  bitter  rivals 
and  have  drenched  the  land  in  blood  for  the  triumph 

5 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


or  the  maintenance  of  that  which  they  represent. 
This  fair  Tuscan  plain  is  a  palimpsest,  a  parchment 
on  which  age  after  age  has  written  its  story,  each 
effacing  or  obscuring  that  which  was  before.  Can 
we  decipher  the  half -obliterated  text?  Let  us  begin 
with  the  earliest  record. 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


The  spell  is  woven  and  the  later  records  are 
effaced.  The  city  by  the  Arno,  the  castles  on  the 
hilltops,  the  villas  with  their  cypresses  and  their 
vines  have  faded.  The  olive  has  but  begun  its 
progress  up  the  long  slopes  which  are  still  dark  with 
the  native  oak  and  give  to  primitive  husbandry  but 
a  limited  domain.  Only  the  mountains  are  here  and 
the  broad  plain  and  the  snatches  of  sunlit  river. 

But  Fiesole  is  here  already,  firmly  seated  upon 
her  convenient  hilltop,  the  same  and  yet  different. 
No  cathedral  or  bell  tower  rises  behind  the  market 
place.  Even  the  theatre  is  not  yet,  and  in  the  place 
of  the  familiar  monastery  with  its  black  gowned 
friars  rises  an  imposing  citadel  in  whose  walls  we 
recognize  the  counterpart  of  the  great  stones  already 
familiar.  Lower  walls  surround  the  city,  and  their 
ponderous  metal  covered  gates  groan  on  huge  pivots 
as  they  swing  to  and  fro  at  rise  and  set  of  sun,  or 
more  hastily  when  danger  threatens,  a  possibility 
evidently  contemplated  by  the  sentinels  who  pace 
the  ramparts.  Through  the  gateway  passes  the 
husbandman  down  the  rugged  path  to  his  distant 
fields,  meeting  the  merchant  with  the  wares  of 
distant  Hellas  or  the  laden  asses  bringing  home  the 

7 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


produce  of  the  fields.  Cattle  and  sheep  and  goats 
add  to  the  motley  procession. 

There  are  not  wanting  signs  of  opulence  and  good 
taste  inside  the  guarded  walls.  Houses  may  be 
poor  and  streets  narrow  and  mean,  but  there  is 
beauty  and  cunning  in  their  golden  jewels  and  the 
well  built  walls  and  imposing  gateways  testify  to 
taste  as  well  as  to  power  and  pride.  The  dead,  too, 
are  provided  with  spacious  tombs  where  sculptured 
angels  with  inverted  torch  guard  their  funeral  urns, 
and  banquets  depicted  upon  the  walls  invite  their 
spirits  to  refreshment.  Nor  are  there  wanting  those 
mysterious  symbols  of  the  written  word  which  alone 
can  rescue  men's  virtues  and  deeds  from  oblivion. 
For  the  Etruscan  is  no  barbarian,  but  the  proud  peer 
of  those  who  are  just  now  building  their  Parthenon 
and  celebrating  their  triumph  over  the  devouring 
east.  The  cunning  wares  of  the  Greek  workshop 
have  found  in  him  not  only  their  best  customer  but 
their  cleverest  imitator,  the  skill  cof  the  Etruscan 
craftsmen  baffling  the  very  elect.  His  wise  men, 
too,  are  skilled  in  all  the  wisdom  of  the  Egyptians 
and  Egyptian  wares  are  among  his  possessions. 

But  above  all  the  Etruscan  stands  for  mastery 
and  the  strong  right  arm.  His  strongholds  are  not 
the  work  of  weaklings.  They  bear  the  stamp,  not 
of  puny  elegance,  but  of  energy  and  purpose.  He 
has  reached  his  own  solution  of  the  great  human 
problem,  a  solution  which  he  regards  with  com- 
placency, perhaps  with  a  sense  of  finality.  Man  was 

8 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


a  hunted  animal  exposed  to  ever  recurring  dangers 
and  constant  terrors.  He  has  built  him  cities  of 
refuge  where  he  may  sleep  in  peace  and  to  which 
he  may  run  to  cover  from  the  marauder.  The 
no-man's-land  between  necessarily  retains  some- 
thing of  its  old  time  perils.  What  reasonable  man 
would  ask  that  the  whole  countryside  be  pacified? 
What  would  become  of  the  virtues  of  hardihood  and 
cunning  if  everything  were  safe?  But  if  men  must 
face  these  dangers  manfully  as  behooves  those  who 
engage  in  the  dangerous  business  of  living,  it  is 
reassuring  to  know  that  the  sentinel  is  watching 
from  his  tower  and  that  if  danger  nears,  the  city 
will  afford  him  succor  or  refuge  according  to  his 
need. 

It  is  a  spotty  civilization.  The  arts  and  the 
graces,  flowers  of  peace,  are  found  only  under  hot- 
house shelter,  biding  the  time  when  a  more  genial 
sun  will  permit  them  to  cover  the  land  and  fill  the 
valley  with  their  perfume. 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


II 

Half  a  millennium  has  passed  and  again  we  stand 
on  the  walls  of  Fiesole.  There  is  change,  yet  less  of 
change,  it  would  seem,  than  might  be  expected  from 
these  momentous  centuries.  The  citadel,  the  walls, 
the  market,  all  are  there  and  little  modified,  yet  in 
disrepair  and  seemingly  less  regarded.  There  is  no 
lookout  in  the  watch  tower  and  the  massive  gateway 
serves  only  the  purposes  of  the  publican.  The 
market  is  still  frequented,  but  more  by  idlers  than 
by  buyers  and  traffic  in  the  varied  wares  is  local  and 
petty.  The  city  would  seem  to  have  prospered,  for 
it  boasts  a  new  theatre  and  other  public  buildings, 
and  new  homes  such  as  even  an  Etruscan  lord  never 
knew.  And  amazing  to  relate,  these  are  built  outside 
the  walls,  some  of  them  far  down  the  slope  and 
quite  beyond  the  reach  of  the  city's  protection. 

Perhaps  the  most  noteworthy  change  is  in  the 
citizens  themselves  when  once  we  become  conscious 
of  it.  They  are  not  afraid,  yet  they  lack  the  old-time 
resoluteness  and  self  confidence.  Though  well-to-do, 
they  give  little  sign  of  enterprise  or  initiative,  like 
men  accustomed  to  follow  rather  than  to  lead,  and 
prosperous  by  inheritance  rather  than  by  achieve- 
ment. Their  pride  is  in  things  ancestral  and  their 

10 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


cherished  distinctions  are  based  on  tradition.  Fie- 
sole  is  of  yesterday.  We  must  look  elsewhere  for 
the  men  of  today. 

Now  that  we  turn  our  gaze  toward  the  valley,  we 
become  gradually  conscious  of  other  changes.  Till- 
age has  changed  its  character  and  become  more 
general.  Long  white  lines  cross  the  plain  which  we 
discover  to  be  roads  definitely  located  and  con- 
structed with  paved  surface  and  crossing  the  streams 
by  bridges  instead  of  by  fords.  And  most  note- 
worthy of  all,  there  is  a  new  city  built  in  the  most 
incredible  of  places,  on  the  flat  land  by  the  river. 
It  is  to  this  that  we  turn  our  attention. 

It  is  not  a  large  city — you  can  walk  through  it 
from  wall  to  wall  in  seven  or  eight  ninutes — for  it  is 
of  recent  origin  and  it  has  not  grown  by  conquest  or 
spoliation.  But  it  is  enterprising  and  prosperous  as 
its  name,  Florentia,  the  flourishing,  aptly,  if  acci- 
dentally, implies.  No  wonder  when  we  see  the  ease 
with  which  it  is  approached  along  the  paved  and 
level  highways.  It  is  not  strange  that  the  laden 
asses  have  forsaken  the  rugged  path  up  to  grim  Fie- 
sole  and  now  drop  their  packs  at  the  river  market 
instead.  It  does  not  take  us  long  to  discover  that 
energy  and  thrift  have  forsaken  sleepy  Fiesole  and 
migrated  to  the  bustling  town  on  the  banks  of  the 
Arno.  The  Fiesolans  are  uneasily  conscious  that 
the  change  is  to  their  disadvantage  and  that  the 
candlestick  has  been  removed  from  its  place.  They 
note  the  wealth  of  the  upstart  rival,  compare  its 

11 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


new  theater  with  their  own,  and  shake  their  heads 
with  envious  disapproval  at  its  arena,  and  gladia- 
torial shows.  Florentia  is  parvenu.  It  has  no 
traditions,  no  quality.  Its  population,  of  scattered 
and  unknown  origin,  has  no  lineage,  no  family.  It 
is  with  due  emphasis  upon  these  heirloom  values 
that  these  heirs  of  the  ages  watch  the  progress  of 
the  supplanter,  for  men  are  more  disposed  to  boast 
of  their  possessions  than  to  confess  their  losses. 

All  this  and  more  is  evident  on  acquaintance,  but 
it  does  not  solve  our  riddle.  How  comes  it  that 
there  is  a  supplanted  and  a  supplanter?  How  is  it 
that  there  is  a  city  on  the  river  bank  where  of  old 
it  was  axiomatic  that  no  city  could  exist?  Whence 
comes  that  new  confidence  that  emboldens  men  to 
build  their  villas  outside  the  walls  and  even  at  a 
distance  from  their  protection?  Whence  these  roads 
and  this  security  unknown  before? 

The  answer  to  these  questions  is  to  be  found  in  a 
larger  fact  of  which  we  are  early  and  increasingly 
conscious.  There  is  a  big  overshadowing  something 
which  is  in  all  men's  thoughts  and  which  enters  into 
all  their  calculations.  Neither  Fiesole  nor  the  new 
Florentia  are  of  a  character  to  account  for  this  new 
confidence,  this  new  security,  this  new  opulence.  It 
is  quickly  apparent  that  they  are  but  tiny  meshes 
in  a  vast  net  which  some  mighty  hand  has  flung 
over  a  turbulent  world.  These  roads  that  the  eye 
follows  out  toward  the  valley's  rim  lead  over  and 
beyond,  to  something  else,  to  something  bigger. 

12 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


They  bring  to  Florentia  and  to  Fiesole  alike  not 
merely  produce  and  cunning  craftsmanship,  but 
authority  and  guidance.  Fiesole  may  look  to  Flo- 
rentia but  Fiesole  and  Florentia  alike  look  to  Rome. 

This  is  the  supreme  change  which  has  been 
wrought  in  these  five  hundred  years.  Fiesole  of  old 
was  all  things  to  herself  and  to  the  little  territory 
that  sought  shelter  in  the  shadow  of  -her  walls. 
With  Clusium  and  Cortona  and  the  rest  she  had 
something  of  an  understanding  and  there  were  rudi- 
mentary arrangements  for  cooperation  in  certain 
extreme  emergencies,  but  these  were  sternly  held  in 
check,  not  to  say  vitiated,  by  a  never  failing  jealousy. 
The  ordering  of  daily  life  was  local  and  its  vision 
introspective.  Neighborly  relations  were  negative 
and  based  on  the  let-alone  ideal.  Hence  the  huddling 
in  fortress  towns,  the  imperfect  tillage  of  surround- 
ing fields  and  the  scant  protection  of  property  and 
life  by  intermittent  foray  and  reprisal.  It  was  a 
system  that  developed  hardihood  and  self-reliance, 
virtues  according  to  its  needs,  as  every  system  does, 
virtues  far  less  in  evidence  in  the  later  reposeful 
Fiesole  or  bustling  Florentia.  Man  kept  his  hand 
on  the  sword  hilt,  and  there  was  the  look  of  a  hunted 
thing  on  the  face  of  civilization. 

Rome  has  changed  all  that.  Gradually  as  her 
dominion  has  become  assured,  she  has  not  only 
subdued  the  strong  places  to  her  will,  but  she  has 
evolved  that  far  reaching  organization  which  has 
brought  the  no-man's-land  under  orderly  adminis- 

13 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


tration.  It  is  not  so  much  her  greater  physical 
power  as  it  is  the  infinitely  more  effective  instru- 
ments through  which  that  power  is  exercised.  Her 
roads  traverse  the  mountains,  her  bridges  span  the 
rivers,  and  her  galleys  cross  the  seas.  Her  police 
patrols,  her  courts,  her  laws  and  her  administrative 
tradition  have  made  banditry  unprofitable  and  piracy 
unsafe. 

It  is  a  new  thing  under  the  sun,  this  policing  of  a 
whole  land  and  the  establishment  of  security  from 
sea  to  sea.  If  the  world  ever  saw  its  like  before  the 
memory  of  it  has  passed  away.  Guided  by  no 
tradition,  inspired  by  no  precedent,  Rome  has  con- 
ceived and  executed  the  mighty  task.  We  can 
hardly  exaggerate  the  importance  of  the  achieve- 
ment or  honor  too  highly  the  people  who  have  thus 
tamed  our  world.  The  hill  cities  have  become 
unnecessary  now  and  their  walls  more  of  a  hindrance 
than  a  help.  Rome  has  herself  signalized  the  advent 
of  a  happier  time  by  tearing  down  the  walls  that 
had  once  been  her  reliance,  judging  them  to  be  no 
longer  a  protection,  but  a  hindrance  to  her  growth. 
Her  splendid  expansion  across  the  broad  campagna 
with  its  far  flung  line  of  gardens  and  villas  is  a 
challenge  to  the  dwellers  in  walled  cities  to  avail 
themselves  of  that  freedom  wherewith  Rome  has 
made  them  free.  Were  it  not  for  that  inertia  which 
so  far  exceeds  all  other  factors  in  determining  the 
ways  of  men,  the  hill  cities,  already  obsolete,  would 
be  forsaken.  But  that  conservatism  which  at  once 

14 


'A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


preserves  our  gains  and  impedes  our  progress,  yields 
but  slowly  to  the  logic  of  events,  and  Florentia  is  a 
pioneer  in  inaugurating  the  new  era.  The  outcome, 
however,  seems  not  doubtful.  If  the  Pax  Romana 
endures,  the  hill  towns  will  be  given  over  to  the 
owls  and  bats. 


15 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


III 

But  no.  The  hill  towns  endure,  have  endured  for 
a  thousand  years  since  last  we  visited  them  in  the 
spirit.  Little  changed  they  seem  in  the  midst  of 
a  world  that  has  undergone  a  melancholy  transforma- 
tion. Rome  has  walls  again  and  her  children  huddle 
in  palaces  now  become  tenements,  and  her  temples 
are  in  ruins.  The  campagna  is  a  wilderness  where 
buffaloes  graze.  Where  once  were  gardens  and 
palaces  are  shapeless  heaps.  The  roads  are  gullied 
and  overgrown  with  bush.  No  legions  march  to 
guard  the  far  frontier  where  Norman  William  and 
Saxon  Harold  struggle  for  the  abandoned  domain. 
For  Rome  has  passed  and  the  Pax  Romana  is  a 
memory. 

How  fares  it  with  Val  d'Arno  and  the  cities  of 
hill  and  plain?  A  glance  suffices  to  show  that  they 
have  not  been  exempt  from  the  world's  tribulation. 
Fiesole  has  found  new  reason  for  existence,  but  an 
existence  without  prosperity  or  power.  A  scanty 
population  now  dwells  meanly  within  her  patched 
up  walls,  seeking  there  safety  from  the  prevailing 
violence.  The  villas  without  the  walls  are  in  ruins 
or  replaced  by  rude  castles.  The  theater  is  aban- 
doned or  devoted  to  ignoble  uses.  The  wares  in  the 
market  are  of  the  simplest  and  garish  gewgaws 

16 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


have  displaced  the  signs  of  culture  and  taste.  Only 
the  temples  are  new,  for  Fiesole  has  placed  her  trust 
in  other  gods  before  whose  symbols  she  bows  with 
servile  reliance  on  their  talismam'c  power.  If  she 
still  looks  to  Rome,  it  is  from  habit  rather  than  with 
any  hope  of  succor  or  guidance.  Fiesole  is  thrown 
upon  herself  again,  but  not  with  her  old  time  pride 
or  power.  She  is  no  longer  mistress  of  the  broad 
valley  which  is  now  parceled  out  into  petty  fiefs 
ruled  from  a  dozen  different  hilltops,  each  crowned 
by  its  castle  or  fortress  house.  Fiesole  in  her  fallen 
estate  is  but  one  of  the  number,  larger  but  hardly 
more  powerful.  Tillage  is  backward  and  the  yield 
is  meager.  Worse  still,  there  is  lawlessness,  and  the 
sower  does  not  always  reap  where  he  sowed.  Life 
has  become  incredibly  simple  and  unwillingly  self- 
sufficing.  A  pallet  of  straw  or  rushes  serves  as  the 
bed  even  of  the  lord  of  the  manor.  The  coarse  fare 
of  his  table  is  such  as  the  neighboring  fields  supply. 
The  sheep  that  graze  in  the  neighborhood  furnish 
the  wool  which  is  carded  and  spun  and  woven  by  the 
household  for  the  household's  use.  Every  hamlet 
has  its  cobbler,  its  carpenter,  its  mason,  whose 
implements  are  fashioned  by  the  local  smith  in  the 
intervals  between  his  tasks  as  armourer  and  farrier. 
There  is  the  priest,  of  course,  the  keeper  of  the 
talismans  and  the  weaver  of  incantations,  and  the 
friar,  his  ubiquitous  associate,  the  two  performing 
as  may  be  with  images  and  rites  the  functions  of 
schoolmaster  and  physician.  But  of  that  manifold 

17 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


and  far  reaching  life  that  had  grown  up  under  the 
Pax  Romana,  little  remains.  The  broken  statues 
and  battered  temples  that  remain  as  its  witnesses 
are  now  woven  about  with  folk  tales  and  given  out 
as  the  gift  of  wonder  worker  and  magician. 

Such  communities  offer  scant  encouragement  to 
the  merchant  and  purveyor  of  luxuries.  The  pack 
animals  are  few  that  make  their  way  over  the 
neglected  roads,  their  owners  evading  or  buying 
off  the  bandits  that  infest  the  way  and  satisfying  the 
scarcely  less  rapacious  gentry  whose  protection  they 
are  compelled  to  seek.  Warily  the  traveler  makes  his 
way  from  castle  to  castle  claiming  the  hospitality 
which  can  not  be  refused  and  not  forgetting  the  gift 
which  is  its  inevitable  counterpart.  Long  standing 
custom  has  hardened  into  law.  The  gift  has  become 
a  tax  and  the  castle  a  toll  gate.  Great  Rome  has 
crumbled  and  these  petty  depotisms  are  the  crumbs. 

But  though  gone,  Rome  is  not  forgotten.  The 
peace  which  she  established  was  so  beneficent,  the 
world  embracing  mechanism  of  her  administration 
was  so  wonderful,  and  her  power  was  so  imposing 
that  the  centuries  during  which  these  things  endured 
have  made  of  Rome  an  imperishable  tradition. 
Gone  but  assuredly  not  perished.  Somewhere  that 
power,  that  world  embracing  authority,  must  still 
exist.  Like  Arthur  of  the  Table  Round,  Rome  must 
come  again  and  resume  her  sway.  Such  is  the  in- 
stinct rather  than  the  reasoned  faith  of  these  simple 
folk  of  the  Middle  Age.  No  rebels  against  authority, 

18 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


they,  but  seekers,  prone  to  accept  its  token,  like 
those  who  of  old  followed  the  star. 

And  Rome  has  come  again,  not,  as  of  old,  seated 
upon  her  seven  hills,  nor  yet  quite  clothed  with  her 
old  majesty,  but  strong  handed  and  all  subduing, 
out  of  the  north,  bearing  the  promise  of  order  again 
and  peace  with  its  old  time  blessings.  The  promise 
has  had  scant  fulfillment,  and  the  authority  estab- 
lished by  this  Rome  of  the  north  has  brought  but 
imperfect  order  and  intermittent  peace.  But  such 
authority  as  there  is  is  largely  of  her  creation.  It 
is  this  reincarnated  Rome  that  placed  these  lordlings 
in  the  castles  and  clothed  them  with  their  petty  au- 
thority. As  appointees  of  a  foreigner  they  were 
originally  strangers  to  Italy,  largely  German,  and 
though  they  have  forgotten  their  German  speech 
and  become  assimilated  into  that  people  who  have 
absorbed  so  many  of  their  race  before,  they  have 
never  lost  the  proud  distinction  of  their  imperial 
appointment.  They  are  Rome,  the  living  embodi- 
ment of  that  authority  that  can  never  die  and  to 
which  men  look  for  peace  and  happiness.  These 
men  have  neither  the  wealth  of  Rome  nor  her  power 
nor  her  genius,  but  they  have  her  tradition.  They 
live  meanly  and  by  doubtful  expedients.  Their 
authority  extends  but  a  few  furlongs  from  their 
doors.  But  nothing  can  obliterate  the  fact  that  they 
have  the  emperor's  warrant,  that  they  wear  the 
livery  of  Rome. 

But  what  of  Florentia,  that  bud  of  promise  that 
19 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


epitomized  the  Pax  Romana  ?  We  have  briefly  over- 
looked the  hopeful  little  town  in  our  broader  survey. 
It  is  not  strange.  Florentia  is  there,  but  she  is  not 
flourishing.  The  changes  we  have  noted  have  borne 
hard  on  a  town  built  for  commerce  rather  than  for 
defence.  The  return  of  lawlessness  has  destroyed 
her  commerce,  and  despite  her  well  built  walls, 
there  is  little  but  inertia  to  account  for  her  continued 
existence.  In  common  with  all  other  communities, 
she  has  to  accept  the  rudimentary  culture  of  a  primi- 
tive agricultural  community  for  the  age  knows  no 
other,  save  in  the  secluded  life  of  the  cloister  where 
a  scant  survival  of  art  and  letters  is  hibernating  in 
hope  of  a  coming  summer.  We  know  not  by  what 
stages  the  flourishing  commercial  city  has  been 
transformed  into  a  sleepy  agricultural  village  where 
cows  graze  in  the  abandoned  places  and  country 
roads  with  mire  and  dust  run  past  rude  walls  and 
dirty  alleys  to  the  petty  margrave's  castle.  If 
"happy  is  that  people  that  has  no  history"  then 
Florence,  as  we  must  now  learn  to  call  her,  has  been 
exceptionally  blessed,  for  there  is  no  record  of  the 
great  transformation.  We  can  not  err  greatly,  how- 
ever, in  picturing  the  change  from  enterprising 
growth  to  stagnation  and  decay.  The  paralysis  of 
authority,  the  increase  of  lawlessness,  the  decline  of 
commerce,  the  straitened  life,  the  exodus  of  popula- 
tion, and  the  decay  of  culture,  these  are  an  inexorable 
sequence.  There  came  a  time  when  there  were  no 
more  shows  in  the  arena.  Abandoned  to  miscella- 

20 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


neous  uses,  it  became  a  market,  a  tenement,  a  stable, 
then  a  quarry  and  rubbish  heap.  So  with  the  tem- 
ples, the  shrines  of  gods  no  longer  reverenced.  So 
with  all  else  that  changed  conditions  have  rendered 
useless.  It  has  been  a  time  of  sorry  undoing. 

There  has  been  construction,  too,  but  rude  and 
simple,  such  as  only  a  later  age  surfeited  with  ele- 
gance will  be  able  to  call  beautiful.  Houses  are 
bare  and  comfortless,  and  even  the  churches  in  the 
building  of  which  fear  of  the  unseen  powers  prompts 
to  man's  utmost  effort,  are  devoid  of  ornament  and 
more  akin  to  the  fortress  than  the  temple.  From 
this  simplification  of  life  which  has  everywhere 
taken  place,  Florence  is  not  exempt.  She  is  one  of 
the  crumbs  and  not  unlike  the  others. 

And  now  again  we  will  drop  the  curtain,  leaving 
the  generations  to  shift  the  scenery  upon  the  stage. 


21 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


IV 

It  is  difficult  to  see  in  the  busy  city  before  us  the 
sleepy  burg  of  two  and  a  half  centuries  before. 
Though  still  a  small  city — you  can  walk  all  round  it 
in  a  couple  of  hours — Florence  has  grown  beyond 
recognition  and  the  new  walls  are  of  much  wider 
circuit  than  those  we  knew.  Even  so  the  city  in 
its  continuing  growth  crowds  hard  against  them  and 
is  compelled  to  accommodate  itself  to  narrow  quar- 
ters. There  are  no  waste  spaces  now,  and  the 
streets,  often  too  narrow  for  two  carts  to  pass,  are 
grudgingly  allowed  only  on  the  ground  level.  Pro- 
jecting upper  stories  economize  the  previous  space 
above  and  afford  shade  from  the  somewhat  too 
ardent  sun.  The  houses,  built  on  surprisingly  narrow 
foundations,  rise  to  an  imposing  height  and,  as  if 
that  were  not  enough,  they  are  surmounted  by  a 
tower  half  as  big  as  themselves,  square  and  plain 
and  bare  of  ornament,  but  crowding  menacingly  to 
the  front  as  if  they  needed  no  excuse  for  their  exist- 
ence. Their  roofs,  too,  are  not  provided  with 
cornices  or  overhanging  eaves  but  are  surmounted 
by  crenellated  battlements  like  the  castles  that  we 
had  previously  noticed  on  the  hilltops. 

We  wonder  what  such  a  house  is  like  inside. 
22 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


Perhaps  we  can  get  a  glimpse  through  the  windows. 
But  now  that  we  look  for  the  windows  we  notice 
for  the  first  time  that  there  are  none  which  will 
serve  our  purpose.  The  lowest  are  from  eight  to 
twelve  feet  from  the  ground,  and  even  so  they  are 
scarce  large  enough  for  cellar  windows,  and  are 
barred  with  iron  rods  an  inch  thick,  set  upright 
and  crosswise  and  close  together.  Higher  up  there 
are  real  windows,  but  still  small  and  with  substantial 
shutters  that  can  be  closed  in  the  case  of  need. 
Even  the  door  is  barely  large  enough  to  admit  a 
single  person,  and  most  forbiddingly  ironclad.  Per- 
haps we  have  struck  the  jail  by  accident.  But  no; 
they  are  all  alike.  Decidedly,  the  Florentine  is 
prepared  for  emergencies. 

The  nature  of  these  emergencies  is  made  clear  as 
we  turn  the  corner.  There  is  a  clamor  and  a  din 
of  arms  as  well  as  of  voices,  between  two  groups 
who  are  ranged  around  two  contestants  armed  to 
the  teeth.  There  are  bruises  and  cuts  and  fallen 
partisans,  and  finally,  of  course,  a  beaten  party 
which  falls  back  sullenly  down  a  narrow  street.  We 
have  scarce  time  to  realize  what  is  happening  when 
the  door  of  a  high  house  opens,  and  the  beaten 
leader  backs  into  it.  There  is  a  rush  of  the  victors 
to  enter,  a  slamming  of  the  door  and  a  creaking  of 
bolts,  and  meanwhile  a  shying  of  stones  or  a  shower 
of  boiling  water  from  the  top  of  the  tall  tower 
already  referred  to,  and  the  baffled  victor  withdraws 
muttering  and  cursing. 

23 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


This  astounding  breach  of  the  peace  within  the 
very  walls  piques  our  curiosity.  Who  are  these 
brigands  and  how  did  they  ever  penetrate  into  the 
city?  There  are  smiles  at  our  ignorance,  and  we  are 
assured  that  we  have  done  the  contestants  grave 
injustice.  They  are  not  brigands  but  the  heads  of 
noble  Florentine  families  maintaining  the  honor  of 
their  house  and  Florentine  tradition.  Within  these 
stern  dwellings  there  is  peace,  obedience,  the  will  of 
a  master,  but  between  them  there  is  feud,  feud  that 
none  would  deign  to  forgive  or  forget,  and  the 
streets  are  the  inevitable  scene  of  conflict. 

But  why  this  conflict?  What  is  all  the  war  about? 
The  answer  is  not  easy.  We  are  told  that  it  is  of 
very  long  standing  and  that  the  sons  grow  up  to 
fight  because  their  fathers  fought  before  them.  The 
fighting  is  quite  inevitable  and  for  that  matter, 
quite  congenial,  and  just  what  it  is  about  is  of  minor 
importance.  To  an  outsider  the  real  things  do  not 
seem  so  very  important  nor  the  important  things 
so  very  real.  At  first  we  learn  only  that  there  are 
two  great  factions,  each  with  its  catch-word,  Guelf 
and  Ghibelline.  The  Guelfs  are  the  party  of  the 
Pope  who  claims  a  sort  of  suzerainty  over  Florence, 
while  the  Ghibellines  are  the  party  of  the  Emperor 
whose  shadowy  claim  to  Florentine  allegiance  is 
in  potential  conflict  with  papal  prerogative.  Both 
parties  are  loud  in  their  protestations  of  allegiance 
and  implacable  in  their  hostility,  but  it  does  not 
take  us  long  to  discover  that  with  all  their  talk  of 

24 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


the  good  emperor  or  the  pope  angelico  who  shall 
some  day  come  and  set  things  right,  these  warring 
factions  are  perfectly  agreed  on  one  point,  namely, 
that  they  want  no  interference  from  these  or  anyone 
else.  They  want  to  be  left  alone  to  fight  it  out  as 
they  see  fit.  So  long  as  pope  and  emperor  do  not 
take  their  rights  too  seriously,  they  can  count  on 
lusty  partisanship  from  their  respective  parties,  but 
woe  to  either  if  he  attempts  to  meddle  with  Floren- 
tine affairs.  There  is  one  thing  that  every  Florentine 
loves  better  than  his  party,  better  even  than  his 
feuds  and  his  fightings,  and  that  is  Florence  and 
her  liberties.  It  is  a  strange  combination,  this 
primitive  simplicity  of  household  rule  coping  with 
the  infinite  restiveness  of  modern  life.  The  new 
wine  has  been  put  into  old  bottles,  and  the  bottles 
are  ready  to  burst. 

But  our  walk  must  go  farther  or  it  will  leave  us 
more  puzzled  than  enlightened.  A  few  steps  bring 
us  to  a  maze  of  streets  packed  with  the  busiest  and 
cleverest  artisans  in  the  world.  Here  one  is  giving 
the  last  touches  to  an  artistic  copper  vessel  which 
without  joints  or  solder  he  has  fashioned  from  a 
single  piece.  Another  is  riveting  a  piece  of  armor, 
another  engraving  with  infinite  deftness  a  golden 
brooch.  There  are  whole  streets  given  over  to 
cloth-dressers,  who  give  work  to  the  spinners  and 
weavers  and  fullers  and  dyers  in  numberless  back 
rooms  and  attics.  There  are  smiths,  and  carvers 
of  wood  and  gilders,  and  joiners,  and  fashioners  of 

25 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


beautiful  things  in  clay  and  wood  and  bronze  and 
iron  and  gold,, in  marble  from  Carrara  and  alabaster 
from  Volterra.  Buyers  throng  the  shops  or  con- 
gregate in  the  crowded  markets,  laying  in  stores 
of  precious  wares  even  for  distant  India  or  semi- 
barbarous  Britain;  and,  strangest  of  all,  they  pay 
for  their  purchases  in  coins  that  do  not  have  to  be 
weighed,  and  which,  bearing  the  stamp  and  seal  of 
Florence,  are  called  florins,  that  is  short  for  Floren- 
tines. 

As  we  watch  the  infinite  dexterity  of  these  artisans, 
we  cannot  but  be  impressed  by  their  resoluteness 
and  self-sufficiency.  They  never  hesitate,  fumble, 
or  spoil.  They  work  with  automatic  precision,  as 
though  they  had  fashioned  the  same  thing  and 
wrought  the  same  design  a  hundred  times  before. 
The  brain  is  as  busy  as  the  hand  and  does  its  part 
as  easily  and  as  well.  There  is  no  waiting  for 
another  to  suggest  or  direct,  no  helplessness  or 
dependence.  From  childhood  up  they  have  learned 
to  think  their  own  thoughts,  to  be  self-sufficient, 
independent,  and  alert.  And  how  plain  it  is  that 
this  habit  of  mind,  once  deeply  implanted,  will 
assert  itself  in  other  than  industrial  connections. 
A  nation  of  tillers  of  the  soil,  or  of  factory  hands  and 
automatic  machine  stuffers,  may  tolerate  a  Caesar; 
a  nation  of  artisans  never.  Will  democracy  survive 
the  extinction  of  artisanship?  There  is  nothing  in 
history  to  warrant  the  hope. 

This,  then,  is  the  new  wine  that  is  bursting  the 
26 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


old  bottles.  Mediaeval  Florence  has  awakened  from 
her  long  sleep  and  has  become  the  center  of  that 
modern  life  that  we  call  industry.  The  great  change 
has  come  about  so  naturally  and  started  so  un- 
obtrusively that  it  is  as  difficult  to  locate  its  be- 
ginning as  it  is  to  find  the  seed  which,  germinating 
long  ago,  has  become  a  great  tree  whose  mighty 
roots  have  split  the  rock  on  which  it  grew.  Some- 
body back  in  the  sleepy  old  burg  whose  interests 
had  scarcely  extended  hitherto  beyond  the  adjoining 
fields,  began  to  do  something  better  than  it  had 
been  done  before.  We  do  not  know  what  or  why. 
Perhaps  it  was  a  new  discovery  or  invention,  or 
maybe  just  a  greater  patience  and  a  finer  taste. 
Whether  embodied  in  trade  secret  or  in  tradition, 
it  persisted  and  the  contagion  spread.  Soon  it  was 
rumored  that  a  better  finished  cloth  could  be  ob- 
tained in  Florence  than  was  produced  elsewhere, 
and  some  came  or  sent  to  procure  it.  Emulation 
brought  other  buyers  and  stimulated  other  producers. 
Trade  became  regular  and  brought  prosperity  to 
those  whose  enterprise  had  made  it  possible. 

Soon  another  step  was  taken.  The  superiority 
of  Florentine  cloth  lay  in  its  finish,  not  in  its  ma- 
terial or  fabric.  It  was  the  finish  that  brought  the 
profit,  not  the  spinning  and  weaving  which  the 
Florentine  had  to  do  on  even  terms  with  others. 
As  the  demand  for  his  cloth  increased,  the  Floren- 
tine had  the  bright  idea  of  buying  the  raw  fabric 
from  other  towns  and  bringing  it  to  Florence  to  be 

27 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


finished.  He  thus  managed  to  concentrate  his  ener- 
gies upon  the  more  profitable  part  of  the  process. 
This  meant  more  buying  and  selling,  more  trans- 
portation, more  commerce.  The  packhorses  were 
now  loaded,  going  and  coming,  and  Florence  became 
busier  and  richer.  Cloth  was  the  great  staple,  but 
not  the  only  one.  The  other  crafts  were  stimulated 
and  new  ones  came  into  being,  until  the  city  became 
the  hive  of  industry  that  we  find  it.  It  is  a  pro- 
found change  through  which  Florence  and  many 
another  community  is  passing.  The  old  barbaric 
simplicity  and  isolation  are  giving  way  to  wealth 
and  luxury,  but  at  the  expense  of  self-sufficiency 
and  independence.  Specialization  and  commerce  are 
the  necessary  conditions  to  which  the  ampler  life 
owes  its  precarious  existence. 

But  no  old  order  changes  giving  place  to  new 
without  protest  and  opposition.  The  present  case 
is  no  exception.  The  trouble  is  that  the  new  order 
has  turned  things  upside  down.  The  new  wealth 
has  not  accrued  to  the  markgraves  and  petty 
lordlings  in  the  hilltop  castles  but  has  quietly  passed 
them  by.  A  set  of  new  leaders,  men  of  great  energy 
and  foresight  but  without  title  or  imperial  warrant, 
have  been  directing  the  new  movement  and  ac- 
quiring its  emoluments.  This  is  galling  enough,  but 
when  the  serf  runs  away  from  the  lordling's  estate 
to  seek  employment  in  the  crafts  of  the  town,  the 
grievance  is  obvious.  The  old  and  new  order  are 
at  feud. 

28 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


Unfortunately  there  has  been  occasion  for  daily 
friction.  The  castles  stood  by  the  highway  along 
which  passes  the  packhorse,  to  and  fro,  with  the 
wares  of  Florence.  An  old  right  based  on  a  vague 
duty  of  protection  entitled  the  owner  to  levy  toll 
on  the  passing  traffic.  Here  was  an  opportunity 
to  intercept  his  share  of  the  profits,  an  opportunity 
which  we  may  assume  that  he  has  not  always  used 
with  moderation.  Even  the  traditional  levy  becomes 
exorbitant  when  the  commerce  has  increased  a  hun- 
dred fold.  Yet  what  castle  owner  could  see  it  so? 
Equally,  what  merchant  could  see  it  otherwise?  As 
commerce,  now  furnishing  its  own  protection,  asks 
naught  of  the  lord,  his  service  has  become  negligible 
and  his  charges  extortionate.  Friction  has  led  to 
blows  and  finally  to  a  definite  policy  of  extermina- 
tion. The  Florentines  have  attacked  the  castles 
one  by  one,  captured  them,  and  put  an  end  to  their 
odious  exactions.  It  was  a  harsh  policy  but  not 
unprovoked,  and  carried  through,  on  the  whole, 
with  moderation.  The  Florentines  have  not  killed 
their  enemies  or  imprisoned  them,  or  even  con- 
fiscated their  property.  They  have  aimed  simply  to 
remove  their  obstruction. 

But  victory,  as  so  often  happens,  has  had  its 
embarrassments.  What  should  be  done  with  these 
beaten  enemies,  men  not  the  most  progressive,  if 
you  will,  but  men  of  wealth  and  prestige  and  above 
all,  men  who  bear  the  emperor's  warrant?  Their 
enmity  is  inevitable.  Left  to  themselves,  they  would 

29 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


certainly  conspire  against  Florence.  The  situation 
is  complicated  by  the  fact  that  other  cities  are 
undergoing  the  same  transformation  as  Florence  and 
are  mortally  jealous  of  her.  In  principle  they  have 
no  more  in  common  with  these  bearers  of  the  em- 
peror's warrant  than  Florence,  but  that  does  not 
prevent  them  from  welcoming  their  alliance  against 
the  hated  rival.  Indeed  Siena  and  others  have 
already  begun  to  shout  for  the  emperor  in  antici- 
pation. 

The  Florentines  have  seen  all  this,  and  realizing 
that  it  would  not  do  to  permit  so  dangerous  an 
alliance,  they  have  decided  that  these  beaten 
enemies  must  come  and  live  in  Florence  where  they 
can  keep  watch  of  them.  It  is  a  hazardous  expedient, 
however  necessary.  Suppose  France  had  insisted 
as  a  condition  of  peace  that  Ludendorf  and  Hin- 
denburg  and  a  few  thousand  Junkers  should  come 
and  live  in  Paris.  What  an  interesting  social  and 
political  situation  it  would  have  produced ! 

The  Tuscan  Junkers  have  come  and  built  their 
high  houses  as  nearly  as  possible  like  the  castles 
they  have  left.  Their  neighbors  have  done  the 
same.  The  city  was  crowded  already  and  eligible 
building  sites  are  few  and  close  together.  The  houses 
of  opposing  factions  were  often  within  speaking 
distance,  and  from  windows  or  tower  or  fighting 
battlement  their  owners  could  exchange  those  ameni- 
ties which  prepare  the  way  for  the  scenes  we  have 
witnessed  on  our  arrival.  The  lesser  folk  gradually 

30 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


have  lined  up  on  the  one  side  or  the  other  as  per- 
sonal interest  or  private  grudge  might  dictate.  The 
original  cause  of  division  is  largely  forgotten,  being 
replaced  bv  private  feuds,  business  rivalries,  polit- 
ical grievances,  and  the  like,  but  the  emperor  and 
his  inevitable  counterpart,  the  pope,  still  serve  as 
slogans  for  factions  that  have  not  the  least  regard 
for  their  interests  and  who  would  equally  resent 
their  dictation.  After  enduring  this  for  a  century, 
the  Florentines  have  concluded  that  their  clemency 
has  been  mistaken.  They  have  expelled  the  Ghibel- 
lines,  confiscated  their  property,  even  torn  down 
their  houses,  and  branded  them  as  traitors. 

But  it  is  one  thing  to  expel  the  Ghibellines  and 
quite  another  to  exorcise  the  spirit  which  they 
brought  with  them.  Private  feuds  now  seam  the 
life  of  Florence  in  every  direction.  True,  all  can 
now  shout  for  the  pope — though  with  the  Ghibellines 
gone  it  isn't  so  very  exciting — but  the  Florentines 
continue  to  quarrel  about  pretty  much  everything 
else.  Indeed,  the  spirit  of  faction  is  far  too  pervasive 
to  be  charged  to  the  account  of  a  few  Junkers. 
Mediaeval  Florence  has  awakened  from  her  long 
sleep  and  has  become  the  center  of  that  modern  life 
which  we  call  industry.  Infinitely  more  live  and 
creative,  life  has  become,  infinitely  better  worth 
while,  perhaps  we  should  say,  for  the  change  is 
very  much  to  our  liking,  but  with  it  has  come  the 
microbe  of  turbulence  and  unrest.  With  the  ex- 
pulsion of  the  Ghibellines  the  last  remnants  of  the 
31 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


Junker  aristocracy  have  disappeared,  and  now  the 
powerful  families  of  the  new  order  are  trying,  singly 
and  in  groups,  to  devise  a  form  of  government  which 
shall  be  adapted  to  a  people  whose  dominant  char- 
acteristic is  that  they  do  not  wish  to  be  governed 
at  all.  A  beginning  has  indeed  been  made,  and  under 
such  a  mayor  as  we  began  with  in  this  year  of  our 
Lord,  1300,  the  government  was  a  force  to  be  reck- 
oned with.  He  was  a  man  of  uncommon  parts,  this 
gonfalonier  or  standard  bearer,  one  Alghieri  by  name, 
more  familiarly  known  as  Dante;  but  Florence  has 
proved  to  be  too  much  even  for  him,  and  he  is  now 
in  exile. 

But  there  are  not  a  few  indications  that  farther 
changes  are  impending.  Florence  is  growing  tired 
of  herself.  It  is  not  so  very  long  since,  in  one  of 
those  street  forays  already  referred  to,  one  partisan 
carried  the  matter  to  a  disastrous  excess  by  setting 
fire  to  the  shop  of  a  hated  rival  when  the  wind  was 
high.  The  flames  spread  to  neighboring  shops  and 
soon  a  whole  quarter  was  in  ashes.  The  flames  even 
laid  hold  of  a  church  in  their  path  which  was  packed, 
according  to  the  custom  of  the  time,  with  waxen 
images  of  worthy  burghers  who,  careful  for  their 
souls'  salvation,  had  commended  themselves  to  their 
patron  saint  by  these  tangible  reminders  of  their 
importance.  With  impartial  fury  the  fire  consumed 
the  fruits  of  industry  and  the  emblems  of  piety 
alike.  There  was  many  an  impoverished  Florentine 
that  night  who,  while  not  questioning  the  natural 

32 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


and  inalienable  right  of  men  to  have  their  feuds  and 
to  fight  them  out  on  occasion,  queried  whether  it  was 
not  possible  to  have  too  much  of  a  good  thing  and 
whether  some  authority  should  not  be  established 
to  umpire  the  game  and  keep  the  contestants  inside 
the  ring.  The  malady  is  working  out  its  own  cure. 
Industry  has  bred  independence,  and  this  has 
resulted  in  turbulence  and  disorder.  But  industry 
has  created  wealth,  and  wealth  now  as  always  is 
crying  out  for  order  and  protection.  The  man  who 
owns  property  has  given  bonds  to  keep  the  peace 
which  is  one  of  the  best  of  reasons  why  no  man  should 
be  wholly  disinherited. 

And  now  once  more  we  will  withdraw  from  the 
busy  scene  and  give  Florence  a  century  and  a  half 
to  work  out  her  own  salvation. 


33 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


V 

It  is  with  a  mingled  sense  of  familiarity  and  change 
that  we  enter  this  city  of  the  mid-fifteenth  century. 
The  Florentines  have  not  been  idle,  if  we  may  judge 
by  the  vast  marble  churches  whose  sculptured 
facades  and  slender  campanili  and  towering  domes 
look  down  upon  the  .tallest  towers  of  the  old  castle 
houses  and  dwarf  the  quaint  old  cathedral  of  St.  John 
which  used  to  seem  so  imposing.  Even  the  old 
cathedral,  though  superseded,  has  gotten  a  sheath- 
ing of  marble  and  new  doors,  such  doors  as  the  sun 
never  saw  before  since  it  made  the  rounds  of  the 
planet.  The  castle  houses,  though  still  here'xmost 
of  them,  are  a  good  deal  remodeled,  and  upon  such 
of  the  towers  as  remain,  where  of  old  were  kept  the 
handy  piles  of  stone  for  warlike  use,  are  now  seen 
flower  pots  and  clothes  lines  that  point  to  a  decay  of 
martial  spirit.  And  noting  this,  we  are  reminded 
that  we  have  seen  no  battles  in  the  streets  and  that 
certain  functionaries  stationed  there  show  signs  of 
interfering  with  those  who  would  carry  their  dis- 
putes beyond  the  point  of  wordy  altercation. 

As  our  walk  takes  us  into  the  more  spacious 
streets  we  observe  that  many  of  the  old  narrow 
battlemented  houses  have  disappeared  and  that  their 

34 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


place  has  been  taken  by  vast  palaces  whose  cut- 
stone  fronts  and  rich  overhanging  cornices  and 
spacious  doorways  are  but  elegant  reminiscences  of 
the  stern  castles  which  they  have  superseded.  Evi- 
dently wealth  has  increased  in  the  interval,  as  these 
spacious  structures  with  their  prodigal  occupancy 
of  precious  space,  attest,  and  yet  not  universally, 
if  we  may  judge  by  what  we  see  in  less  favored 
streets.  Here  again  workmen  swarm  as  of  old,  but 
not  all  have  bettered  their  condition  in  this  palace 
building  era.  It  is  even  rumored  that  a  young  man 
cannot  start  now,  as  once  he  could,  by  earning  skill 
and  outfit  for  himself;  but  that  it  has  become  cus- 
tomary to  borrow  money  for  the  outfit  from  certain 
persons  who  make  a  specialty  of  such  loans,  and 
that  the  relations  thus  established  are  often  long 
continued  and  sometimes  irksome.  We  wonder  how 
these*'  less  favored  citizens  get  along  with  their 
affluent  neighbors  who  live  in  the  big  houses  in  the 
broad  streets.  Does  the  old  method  of  drawing  the 
name  of  the  gonfalonier  by  lot  from/a  representative 
list  of  citizens  still  persist?  If  so,  there  must  be 
awkward  predicaments  sometimes  when  an  artisan 
bears  rule  over  the  millionaire  to  whom  he  is  in  debt 
for  his  tools. 

But  it  is  plain  that  we  are  novices.  We  are  told 
that  no  such  embarrassment  occurs.  Chance  has 
willed  for  a  long  time  that  the  name  drawn  should 
be  that  of  a  well-to-do  citizen  more  or  less  experi- 
enced in  public  affairs,  a  citizen,  too,  in  uniform 
35 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


agreement  with  the  ruling  policy  and  spirit  of  the 
republic.  Just  why  this  happy  discrimination  of 
change,  no  one  seems  to  know.  Perhaps  Providence 
guides  the  choice  according  to  the  old  and  somewhat 
discredited  view;  or,  as  the  less  reverent  have  been 
known  to  suggest,  something  may  have  happened 
to  the  names  in  the  box.  No  one  seems  to  know,  and, 
stranger  still,  no  one  seems  greatly  to  care.  We  are 
told  that  it  does  not  amount  to  so  much  to  be 
gonfalonier  as  it  once  did,  and  that  people  care  less 
about  it  now  that  the  really  important  questions  are 
decided  by  Cosimo. 

Cosimo!  Here  is  a  new  name.  Evidently  we 
have  found  a  clew  that  it  will  pay  us  to  follow  up. 
The  inquiry  leads  us  back  a  long  way,  almost  back 
to  the  time  of  our  former  visit.  And  this,  in  brief, 
is  the  result. 

Cosimo  is  the  head  of  a  very  old  and  wealthy 
family,  one  of  the  families,  indeed,  that  were  living 
in  the  high  towered  houses  at  the  time  of  our  former 
visit.  It  was  a  family  of  humble  origin,  however, 
boasting  no  imperial  warrant  or  blue  blood,  and  less 
inclined  than  some  others  to  forget  its  plebeian 
affinities.  The  foundations  of  its  fortunes  had  been 
laid  in  the  not  very  highly  regarded  business  of  pill 
selling,  and  so,  in  default  of  our  handy  device  of 
family  names,  they  are  known  as  the  pillsellers,  or 
Medici.  It  is,  to  be  sure,  a  very  long  time  since  they 
have  done  any  pillselling,  so  long,  indeed,  that  the 
name,  associated  with  their  later  and  greater  doings, 

36 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


has  acquired  a  new  meaning,  but  they  seem  no  wise 
ashamed  of  it,  and  even  decorate  their  new  coat 
of  arms  with  pills.  Like  many  another  Florentine 
family,  they  have  lent  their  surplus  capital  on 
favorable  terms,  rather  against  the  rules  of  the 
church,  to  be  sure,  which  forbid  the  taking  of 
interest,  but  in  this  case  as  in  so  many  others, 
the  church  khas  been  mistaken  in  its  judgment  of 
business  ethics,  and  the  pillsellers  see  it.  Unlike 
most  wealthy  families,  however,  the  pillsellers  have 
specialized  in  a  line  of  business  investment  commonly 
regarded  as  precarious.  They  seem  never  to  have 
lost  touch  with  the  humbler  classes  out  of  whose 
ranks  they  have  arisen,  and  while  others  have  sought 
borrowers  of  means,  who  could  give  tangible  security 
for  their  loan,  the  pillsellers  early  began  to  choose 
promising  young  men,  and  start  them  in  business 
with  only  a  character  security.  Sometimes,  of  course, 
they  have  lost,  but  probably  no  oftener  than  the 
others.  Moreover,  their  protegees  are  likely  to  be 
business  clients  for  the  rest  of  their  lives,  and  to 
recognize  a  debt  of  gratitude  long  after  the  other 
debt  has  been  paid. 

Little  by  little  this  informal  money  lending  has 
grown  into  banking.  In  common  with  other  wealthy 
families,  the  pillsellers  have  elaborated  that  great 
science  which,  more  than  any  other,  lies  at  the 
foundation  of  modern  industry.  They  have  helped 
to  bring  about  the  coinage  of  the  golden  florin ;  they 
have  devised  bills  of  exchange  to  save  transporting 

37 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


money;  they  have  undertaken  the  safe  keeping  of 
other  peoples'  money,  and,  finding  that  they  can 
count  on  large  sums  pretty  constantly  from  that 
source,  they  have  loaned  it  on  interest.  Their 
transactions  have  grown  to  immense  proportions, 
and  they  have  become  the  creditors  of  kings,  not 
neglecting,  meanwhile,  the  promising  youth  whose 
interests  they  could  safely  promote,  and  who  will 
be  likely  to  be  a  staunch  Medican,  a  pillsellerite, 
forever  afterward,  in  consequence  of  their  assist- 
ance. The  pillsellers,  you  see,  are  good  business  men 
gifted  with  unfailing  good  sense,  and  favored  with 
uninterrupted  good  fortune,  for  the  two  are  not 
greatly  different. 

But  the  pillsellers  are  more  than  business  men. 
From  a  very  early  date  they  have  shown  a  large 
interest  in  public  affairs.  Before  the  days  of  Dante, 
a  pillsellerjWas  gonfalonier  of  Florence.  But  for  the 
most  part,  they  do  not  seem  to  have  been  aspirants 
for  office.  They  are  merely  influential  citizens  whose 
word  carries  weight  simply  because  they  show  un- 
erring judgment  in  questions  of  public  policy.  Their 
supremacy  has]  rested  from  the  first  simply  upon 
their  record  of  sagacity  and  wisdom,  the  most 
legitimate  of  all  possible  titles  to  power.  Nor  is 
there  reason  to  doubt  their  disinterestedness  as  such 
things  go.  Of  course  they  have  been  guided  largely 
by  their  own  business  interests,  but  they  sincerely 
believe  that  the  general  interest  is  identical  with  their 
own,  and,  as  matters  stand,  they  have  been  essen- 

38 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


tially  correct.  The  fact  that  a  man  gains  by  a  given 
policy  does  not  prove  that  he  is  selfish  in  supporting 
it.  Who  is  a  manufacturer  and  does  not  believe 
that  the  welfare  of  the  nation  depends  on  the  policy 
of  protection?  Who  is  a  receiver  of  a  fixed  salary 
and  does  not  feel  that  it  would  be  disastrous  to  lessen 
the  purchasing  power  of  money?  The  pillsellers  are 
human  and  judge  public  interests  by  their  own;  but 
they  have  judged  broadly  and  wisely,  and  Florence 
has  found  her  interest  in  following  their  judgment. 
For  two  generations  now,  this  guidance  of  public 
affairs  has  been  their  dominant  function.  A  certain 
John  the  pillseller,  through  his  long  life,  acquired  a 
reputation  so  great  that  deference  to  his  judgment 
became  a  habit.  Almost  without  knowing  it,  he 
became  the  responsible  head  of  the  state,  and  found 
himself  compelled  to  do  what  was  doubtless  suf- 
ficiently to  his  liking,  namely,  to  organize  a  compact 
body  of  supporters,  thwart  opposition,  and  become 
responsible  not  only  for  suggesting,  but  for  executing, 
the  policy  of  the  government,  Something  of  the 
sort,  of  course,  the  pillsellers  had  done  already,  but 
the  policy  of  the  pillsellers  now  took  more  definite 
shape.  Loans  were  placed  systematically  where  they 
would  win  an  adherent  or  embarrass  an  opponent. 
Nothing  did  so  much  to  disarm  an  irreconcilable 
as  to  get  a  mortgage  on  his  property.  If  he  could 
not  be  induced  to  become  a  debtor,  he  suddenly 
found  his  competitors  underselling  him,  presumably 
because  they  were  obtaining  funds  on  more  favorable 
39 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


terms  than  he.  Careful  planning  predetermined 
the  results  of  popular  elections.  In  all  this  there 
was  doubtless  much  that  would  not  bear  the  light. 
There  is  apt  to  be  in  practical  politics.  It  is  perhaps 
only  fair  to  remember  that  the  opponents  thus 
silenced  were  often  selfish,  shortsighted,  and  dema- 
gogic; that  the  methods  used  against  them  were 
perfectly  acceptable  to  them;  that  no  agreement 
on  a  wise  policy  could  have  been  effected  by  purely 
rational  means;  and  finally  and  above  all,  that  the 
policy  adopted  was,  in  general,  wise  and  just,  that 
no  effort  was  made  to  rob  the  state  for  private  ends, 
and  that  Florence  prospered  under  the  new  regime. 
As  the  representative  of  wealth  the  new  manage- 
ment was  the  uncompromising  foe  of  disorder  and 
anarchy.  Private  feuds  smouldered  low,  street  riots 
were  suppressed,  justice  was  meted  out  in  the  courts, 
and  industry  prospered  in  all  her  goings.  John  the 
pillseller  was  no  idealist,  though  he  had  his  ideals. 
He  took  men  as  he  found  them,  never  asking  the 
impossible  of  them,  playing  off  their  meannesses  and 
sordid  passions  against  one  another,  and  giving  to 
each  the  incentive  suited  to  his  nature.  He  was  no 
reformer,  no  zealot.  He  strove  to  make  a  working 
arrangement  with  the  material  at  hand.  He  was 
disinterested  and  sagacious  beyond  the  measure  of 
most.-  It  was  with  not  a  little  anxiety  and  regret 
that  the  Florentines  laid  him  to  rest,  full  of  years 
and  of  honors,  not  knowing  what  would  be  the  out- 
come under  the  leadership  of  the  youthful  grandson, 

40 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


Cosimo,  who  was  to  succeed  to  his  fortune  and  his 
responsibilities. 

It  was  indeed  a  perilous  moment  for  the  untried 
youth,  for  the  opposition,  always  powerful,  now  saw 
its  opportunity.  A  swift  alliance  of  rivals  in  busi- 
ness and  politics  headed  by  men  of  ability  and 
decision,  overthrew  the  established  order,  and  gave 
Florence  new  masters.  Cosimo  was  thrown  into 
prison,  and  his  friends  scattered.  A  part  of  the  new 
cabal  urged  his  execution,  but  that  conscience  which 
doth  make  cowards  of  us  all  was  too  much  for  these 
men,  who  were  by  no  means  dead  to  traditions  of 
honor,  and  exile  was  decreed  instead. 

Now  the  sagacity  of  the  pillsellers  became  ap- 
parent. Suddenly  the  little  traders  and  artisans  of 
Florence  found  that  the  peoples'  bank  could  no 
longer  extend  to  them  the  accustomed  accommoda- 
tion. Banks  with  other  affiliations  would  not,  and, 
for  a  time,  could  not,  take  its  place.  Above  all 
the  new  rulers  could  not  at  once  create  a  con- 
stituency of  men  who  owed  to  them  their  business 
existence.  The  new  rulers  had  certain  powerful 
business  interests  behind  them,  but  the  people  gravi- 
tated to  the  side  of  the  family  which  had  so  con- 
spicuously identified  its  fortunes  with  the  interests 
of  humble  citizens.  Even  big  business  was  sensitive 
to  any  injudicious  move  in  public  policy.  There 
was  brief  but  sullen  acquiesence  in  the  new  order  of 
things,  during  which  the  new  leaders  vied  with  their 
predecessors  in  sagacity  and  statesmanship.  But 

41 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


the  first  slip  produced  a  clamor,  a  demonstration, 
then  a  revolution  ending  in  the  recall  of  Cosimo 
and  the  expulsion  of  his  enemies. 

The  young  man  returned  in  state  and  with  a 
following  that  increased  as  he  approached,  until 
when  he  entered  Florence,  his  retinue  was  that  of  a 
prince.  Humility  was  not  his  characteristic  but  his 
head  was  not  turned.  He  set  to  work  with  the  utmost 
energy  to  restore  the  working  efficiency  of  the  organi- 
zation and  to  entrench  its  power.  The  first  thing 
was  to  fix  the  box  of  names  from  which  the  officers 
were  drawn  by  lot,  for  it  must  be  remembered  that 
all  this  time  the  pillsellers  and  their  chief  supporters 
held  no  office.  The  box  of  names  once  fixed — by 
perfunctory  but  perfectly  regular  popular  vote — 
this  has  since  given  no  trouble.  The  offices  have 
been  apportioned  to  faithful  and  docile  men  who 
are  gratified  by  the  semblance  of  power  and  are 
willing  loyally  to  obey  orders.  Such  arrangements 
are  not  unknown  in  other  times,  but  my  impression 
is  that  they  seldom  work  quite  so  smoothly  as  under 
Cosimo.  Affairs  of  state  have  been  managed  with 
the  same  sagacity  and  public  spirit  as  before,  as  the 
growing  power  and  broadening  influence  of  Florence 
attest. 

The  family  fortunes,  too,  have  not  been  neglected, 
and  Cosimo  has  found  that  things  come  decidedly 
his  way.  Not  only  has  the  bank  prospered  in  com- 
mon with  the  city,  but  new  sources  of  profit  have 
opened.  There  are  chances  for  foreign  loans,  and 

42 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


what  could  be  more  natural  than  that  these  loans 
should  be  placed  with  a  bank  which  has  so  much 
power  to  insure  Florentine  friendship?  Cosimo  has 
known  how  to  turn  everything  to  hand,  weaving  the 
gossamer  web  of  debt  about  states  and  princes,  until 
they  are  helpless  in  the  toils  of  his  subtle  diplomacy. 
Not  that  diplomatic  ends  ever  blind  him  to  the 
importance  of  getting  good  interest,  but  he  possesses 
the  rare  faculty  of  killing  two  birds  with  every  stone 
he  throws.  There  was  not  long  since  a  great  council 
of  the  empire  up  at  Constance  at  which  the  emperor 
presided  over  grave  discussions  of  theology,  the 
principal  result  of  which  was  the  burning  of  one 
more  heretic.  Cosimo  was  present  as  a  pillar  of  the 
orthodox  party — Cosimo  and  his  kind  are  always 
orthodox — and  incidentally  he  arranged  a  loan  with 
the  ever  impecunious  emperor  on  which  he  cleared 
several  million  florins.  It  is  all  right  enough.  He 
is  sincere  in  his  orthodoxy,  even  if  it  is  not  the  thing 
he  lies  awake  nights  to  think  about.  There  are 
those  who  have  the  real  microbe  who  do  not  have 
it  very  hard.  Meanwhile  Cosimo  has  been  false  to 
no  trust  reposed  in  him.  The  citizens  of  Florence 
knew  that  he  would  return  with  added  wealth  and 
prestige,  and  they  felt  sure  that  both  would  accrue 
to  their  benefit,  and  they  were  right. 

But  there  has  been  a  new  development  in  pill- 
seller  policy.  Florence  has  grown  rich,  and  habits 
have  changed  accordingly.  Men  need  much  guid- 
ance in  making  money,  but  they  need  much  more 

43 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


in  spending  it.  It  suits  both  the  tastes  and  the 
interests  of  Cosimo  to  assume  the  leadership  of 
Florence  in  the  formation  of  those  tastes  and  habits 
which  are  the  necessary  condition  of  wealth's  doing 
us  any  good.  Florence  in  her  wealth  getting  has  been 
as  materialistic  and  parvenu  as  any  American  city, 
and  she  owes  it  in  no  small  degree  to  this  wonderful 
family  that  she  has  become  cultured  as  well  as  rich. 
Cosimo  is  admirably  fitted  to  lead  in  this  new 
development.  He  is  shrewd  and  sagacious,  but  he 
loves  beauty,  culture,  refinement — in  short  the  higher 
things  of  life.  It  is  his  pleasure  to  patronize  learning 
and  art,  and  he  has  done  so  discriminatingly.  No 
man  can  ever  successfully  teach  men  to  love  the 
best  things  unless  he  himself  loves  them.  Equally 
free  from  asceticism  and  voluptuousness,  he  has 
played  admirably  the  role  which  fortune  has  assigned 
him. 

But  it  has  also  been  good  policy.  There  were 
disappointed  and  sullen  rivals  in  Florence  who  might 
have  nursed  dangerous  ambitions.  There  were  still 
those  who  remembered  that  Florentines  were  once 
free  and  who  aspired  to  be  liberators.  Nothing 
could  be  more  desirable  than  to  turn  these  dan- 
gerous rivalries  into  new  channels,  and  to  substitute 
culture  ideals  for  political  ideals  as  the  goal  of 
private  ambition.  So  Cosimo  has  adopted  the  policy 
of  Pisistratus  and  Pericles  and  with  even  greater 
success.  We  are  amazed  at  his  liberality  and  the 
wide  range  of  his  interests.  The  chief  sculptors  and 

44 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


painters  have  all  been  in  his  employ.  His  agents  in 
Constantinople  have  standing  orders  to  buy  at  any 
price  any  Greek  manuscript  that  comes  upon  the 
market.  In  some  cases  scholars  have  been  given 
a  standing  account  at  the  bank  and  their  drafts 
honored  at  sight.  Think  of  it,  you  whose  devotion 
to  the  cause  of  learning  has  laid  upon  you  a  vow  of 
poverty !  It  is  easy  to  understand  that  art  flourishes, 
for  back  of  this  boundless  liberality  is  discrimina- 
tion, devotion,  real  interest.  And  the  spirit  has 
been  contagious.  New  rivalries  have  brought  new 
gifts,  and  have  forced  with  hothouse  rapidity  the 
aesthetic  development  of  a  singularly  aesthetic 
people.  It  is  with  the  consciousness  of  a  great  task 
greatly  accomplished  that  Cosimo  looks  back  over  a 
life  now  drawing  to  its  close.  The  murmurings  have 
died  away  and  the  jealousies  have  been  smothered 
under  the  growing  sense  of  the  splendor  of  his 
achievement.  In  the  same  grave  with  his  beloved 
Donatello,  there  in  front  of  the  high  altar  of  San 
Lorenzo,  he  has  asked  to  be  buried,  where  a  grateful 
people  will  soon  write  upon  the  marble  above  him: 
"Cosimo,  Pater  Patriae." 


45 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


VI 

It  is  with  eager  expectancy  that  we  return,  after 
a  brief  generation,  to  this  center  of  brimming  life. 
Things  must  have  happened  since  we  left.  In  a 
situation  so  tense,  with  life  so  dynamic,  and  an 
equilibrium  so  delicate,  the  life  of  Florence  can  not 
have  remained  uneventful. 

We  are  not  to  be  disappointed.  The  march  of 
events  has  been  at  quickened  pace  in  the  interval 
and  centuries  have  been  packed  into  a  lifetime. 
Cosimo  has  passed  as  was  foreseen,  as  has  his 
talented  and  worthy  son,  after  all  too  brief  an  experi- 
ence of  his  admirable  management.  Once  more  the 
fortunes  of  family  and  state  have  been  confided  to 
a  youth,  the  incomparable  Lorenzo.  It  speaks  much 
for  the  record  of  this  wonderful  family  that  at  the 
age  of  twenty  this  youth  should  have  been  formally 
requested  by  a  deputation  of  representative  citizens 
to  take  the  direction  of  Florentine  affairs.  If  our 
knowledge  of  the  all  powerful  organization  which 
holds  Florence  in  its  grip  somewhat  tempers  the 
significance  of  this  expression  of  confidence,  it  must 
be  remembered  that  Lorenzo  has  already  won  his 
spurs  at  the  age  of  sixteen  in  a  difficult  diplomatic 
mission  to  the  court  of  Milan  which  he  discharged 

46 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


with  consummate  ability.  With  becoming  modesty 
but  with  legitimate  confidence,  therefore,  he  has 
accepted  the  inevitable  commission. 

The  burden  has  not  grown  lighter  with  the  years 
nor  has  the  new  leadership  passed  unchallenged. 
It  is  significant,  however,  of  the  change  wrought  by 
the  genius  of  Cosimo  that  the  opposition  encountered 
by  Lorenzo  has  come,  not  from  rival  Florentines 
but  from  rival  states.  He  early  found  it  necessary 
to  thwart  the  pope  in  an  ambitous  scheme  of  state- 
building  which  he  deemed  inimical  to  Florentine 
interests.  The  pope  thereupon  entered  into  a  con- 
spiracy with  certain  disaffected  Florentines  to  kill 
both  Lorenzo  and  his  brother.  It  is  characteristic 
of  the  times  that  the  arch-conspirator  in  such  a 
scheme  should  have  been  the  pope,  that  his  local 
manager  should  have  been  the  archbishop  of 
Florence,  that  the  person  chosen  to  strike  the  blow 
should  have  been  a  priest,  that  the  place  chosen 
should  have  been  a  church  and  the  occasion  selected 
the  celebration  of  high  mass.  Characteristic  of  the 
times,  I  say,  not  of  the  church.  Such  means  are 
as  repugnant  to  the  Vatican  now  as  to  ourselves, 
but  the  age  had  not  outgrown  the  earlier  tradition 
of  violence,  and  institutions  are  seldom  wholly 
exempt  from  the  spirit  of  the  age. 

The  plot  failed  in  its  main  object.    The  brother 

was  killed  but  Lorenzo  escaped.     Then  Florence, 

the  old-time  Guelf  stronghold  and  chief  partisan  of 

the  pope,  broke  forth  in  fury  at  this  attack  upon 

47 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


her  national  independence.  Divining  the  source  of 
the  attack,  she  hung  the  archbishop  by  the  neck  from 
his  palace  window.  His  Florentine  accomplices 
were  hunted  and  exterminated.  Popular  fury  raved 
itself  out. 

The  pope  was  furious  but  dissembling.  While  dis- 
claiming complicity  in  the  plot,  he  demanded  that 
Florence  expel  the  Medici,  and  when  this  was  refused, 
he  excommunicated  the  whole  city.  Though  gravely 
handicapped  by  the  ban,  the  Florentines  had  no 
thought  of  yielding.  Soon  Florence  found  herself 
confronted  by  a  powerful  coalition  of  states  which 
she  was  unable  to  resist.  The  war  went  steadily 
against  her  and  she  seemed  on  the  brink  of  ruin, 
when  Lorenzo  took  one  of  those  great  resolves  that 
are  the  privilege  of  genius.  Unarmed  and  alone  he 
embarked  at  Leghorn,  and  sailed  to  Naples,  the 
capital  of  the  most  perfidious  of  his  foes.  He  was 
still  young,  sickly,  and  homely  to  look  upon,  but  he 
knew  his  power.  He  knew  that  the  very  perfidy 
of  the  king  made  it  easy  to  detach  him  from  the 
alliance,  if  he  could  see  his  interest  in  betraying  his 
allies.  We  shall  never  know  the  secret  of  that 
encounter  between  coarse  self  interest  and  subtle 
intellect.  We  can  but  guess  what  were  the  arguments 
used,  what  the  nameless  charm  by  which  this  most 
gifted  of  Florentines  drew  the  toils  around  his  clumsy 
antagonist.  Suffice  it  to  say  that  when  Lorenzo 
disembarked  again  at  Leghorn,  he  bore  with 
him  the  document,  signed  and  sealed,  of  an 

48 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


alliance  with  the  King  of  Naples.  This  threw  the 
balance  heavily  on  the  side  of  Florence  and  made 
peace  inevitable.  The  pope,  again  baffled,  was  at 
the  end  of  his  resources. 

Imagine  what  the  Florentines  think  of  this  won- 
derful youth,  risking  his  life  in  a  self-assumed  role, 
saving  his  country  in  a  bloodless  encounter,  and 
snatching  the  laurels  from  heads  grown  gray  in 
scheming  and  diplomacy.  Lorenzo's  throne  has  ever 
since  been  the  firmest  in  Europe.  Every  subsequent 
move  has  confirmed  his  power.  The  other  states 
have  found  themselves  entangled  in  the  meshes  of 
diplomacy,  played  off  against  one  another,  till  in- 
dependent action  has  become  impossible.  Florence 
is  the  arbiter  of  Italy. 

And  now  the  Medicean  policy  has  received  the 
further  development  that  changing  circumstances 
and  the  personality  of  Lorenzo  require.  The  func- 
tions of  the  great  head  of  the  house  have  become 
more  avowedly  public.  He  is  more  completely  busied 
with  affairs  of  state  and  less  free  to  attend  to  his  own. 
Inevitably  the  family  fortune  has  suffered,  partly 
from  neglect,  more  from  the  heavier  outlay  required 
by  the  princely  role  which  the  genius  of  the  family 
has  created.  The  splendor  of  the  throne  is  insepar- 
able from  its  grandeur  and  power.  Insensibly  the 
royal  function  of  the  family  has  become  a  charge 
upon  the  state.  Doubtless  definite  items  were  first 
charged  to  public  account — items  easily  justified 
in  connection  with  definite  services — then  more  and 

49 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


vaguer  items,  and  finally  a  princely  income  is  now 
systematically  diverted  into  the  family  coffers.  Tech- 
nically this  is  embezzlement,  for  Lorenzo  is  in  name 
only  a  private  citizen.  But  in  fact  he  is  a  prince, 
and  his  functions  wholly  public.  His  services  are 
indubitable  and  his  resources  inadequate.  The 
laborer,  it  may  be  argued,  is  worthy  of  his  hire. 
But  it  is  a  weakness  that  the  laborer  can  show  no 
regular  credentials  and  has  to  be  paid  on  the  sly. 
The  present  is  a  moment  of  transition  from  citizen- 
ship to  kingship,  a  moment  in  which  neither  the 
ethics  nor  the  mechanism  of  finance  is  sufficiently 
elaborated  to  suit  the  occasion.  How  can  he  enter 
the  field  of  competitive  business  with  any  fairness 
to  his  private  rivals?  Yet  how  can  he  meet  his 
enormous  responsibilities  in  default  of  the  income 
which  he  is  thus  forbidden  to  secure?  It'is  a  difficult 
situation  in  which  transactions  that  seem  necessary 
and  just  to  the  sympathetic  are  sure  to  wear  the 
ugly  guise  of  theft  to  the  envious  and  unreconciled. 
It  is  a  delicate  matter  for  an  unofficial  public  servant 
to  determine  his  own  remuneration  and  help  himself 
from  the  public  chest  without  treasury  warrant  or 
audit  for  his  account.  It  is  not  clear  that  Lorenzo 
has  proved  equal  to  the  requirement.  It  is  a  com- 
plicated question,  not  easy  to  settle,  and  we  may  as 
well  wait  till  the  judgment  day. 

But  it  is  in  the  new  role  of  art  patron  and  culture 
leader  of  Florence  that  Lorenzo  has  attained  his 
highest  eminence.  Liberal  by  nature  and  now 

50 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


having  the  resources  of  a  rich  state  at  his  disposal, 
his  patronage  of  art  has  become  most  munificent. 
But  the  patronage  of  art  means  more  than  the 
spending  of  money.  Great  as  is  the  power  of  wealth, 
it  can  as  easily  hinder  as  help  the  cause  of  culture. 
It  all  depends  on  what  you  spend  your  money  for. 
Lorenzo  is  in  his  tastes  a  refined  Epicurean.  For 
him  puritanism  and  asceticism  have  no  attractions. 
But  the  spirit  of  indulgence  is  in  him  so  tempered 
by  refinement  and  good  taste  that  it  seldom  wears 
the  ugly  aspect  of  vice  or  sensuality.  The  coarser 
lusts  are  to  him  not  so  much  wicked  as  vulgar  and 
inartistic.  Good  taste  will  go  a  long  way  toward 
doing  the  work  of  conscience,  and  it  is  the  corner 
stone  of  Lorenzo's  character.  Under  his  subtle 
leadership  the  Florentine  love  of  pleasure  has  grown 
into  a  beauty  cult,  in  which  art  flourishes  as  it  has 
flourished  but  once  before  in  human  history.  Him- 
self a  poet  and  scholar  of  no  mean  attainments, 
Lorenzo  never  mistakes  an  artist,  a  philosopher,  a 
scholar.  His  dreamy  eye  unerringly  detects  beauty 
in  all  its  forms,  distinguishing  the  true  from  the 
false,  the  fundamental  from  the  local  and  temporary, 
the  beautiful  from  the  whimsical,  the  sensational, 
and  the  clever.  Around  his  table  and  living  upon 
his  bounty  sit  the  most  remarkable  group  of  men — 
scholars,  poets,  philosophers,  artists — ever  gathered 
under  a  single  roof.  By  what  magic  does  he  hold 
these  independent  spirits  in  leash  ?  By  what  divina- 
tion has  he  foreseen  their  unrevealed  possibilities? 
51 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


And  who  but  the  inscrutable  Lorenzo  would  have 
taken  into  his  home  and  into  his  intimate  favor  this 
unprepossessing  youth,  Michelangelo? 

Shallow  criticism  finds  an  easy  mark  in  the  great 
magician.  It  is  easy  to  point  out  his  shortcomings, 
to  note  his  disparagement  of  austere  righteousness, 
his  compromises  with  conscience,  his  too  complacent 
acceptance  of  the  foibles  of  men  which  he  under- 
stands so  well  how  to  manipulate  for  his  purpose. 
It  is  not  so  easy  to  estimate  his  services  to  public 
order  or  the  value  of  that  ideal  of  beauty  which  to 
the  many  is  not  yet  revealed. 

None  the  less  there  are  ominous  signs  that  the 
brilliant  regime  of  the  Medici  has  been  weighed  in 
the  balance  and  found  wanting.  Criticism,  mo- 
mentarily hushed  as  the  great  Magnifico  lies  upon 
his  death  bed,  has  of  late  grown  menacing.  The 
impetus  which  circumstance  and  genius  have  given 
to  the  great  culture  movement  has  spent  itself, 
and  the  lassitude  that  follows  strenuous  exertion  is 
manifesting  itself  in  signs  of  restiveness  and  reaction. 
The  neo-pagan  culture  is  no  longer  a  novelty  and  is 
going  out  of  fashion. 

But  there  are  deeper  reasons  for  reaction,  reasons 
long  held  in  leash,  but  now  released  by  the  changing 
temper.  The  cult  of  pleasure  which  has  impelled 
the  few  of  the  noblest  flights  of  fancy  and  the  highest 
inspiration,  has  meant  for  many  the  complacent 
gratification  of  passion.  The  subtle  philosophy  of 
revised  Platonism,  with  all  its  lofty  idealism,  has 

52 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


wrought  havoc  with  the  simple  faith  that  once  kept 
men  in  the  fear  of  the  Lord.  Right  and  wrong, 
become  matters  of  taste,  have  lost  their  cogency  to 
the  minds  of  the  many  who  see  in  matters  of  taste 
only  personal  liking  and  caprice.  Undeniably  the 
urbanity  of  the  times  hides  much  that  is  unsightly 
in  private  life.  Even  in  the  church  and  the  cloister 
culture  and  intellectual  subtlety  have  taken  the 
place  of  devotion  and  chastening  of  spirit. 

This  growing  murmur  of  criticism  has  recently 
burst  into  a  storm  of  protest  in  the  voice  of  a  terrible 
monk  whose  preaching  is  now  the  sensation  of 
Florence.  Recently  appointed  prior  of  San  Marco, 
one  of  the  most  complacent  of  Medicean  strongholds, 
he  has  effected  an  almost  immediate  revolution. 
The  artistic  dilettantism,  the  mundane  philosophiz- 
ing, and  political  scheming  of  this  modernized 
cloister  have  given  place  to  systematic  devotion  and 
the  stern  regime  of  St.  Dominic.  It  is  easy  to  imagine 
the  mutterings,  perhaps  even  the  plottings  and  in- 
cipient revolts  encountered  by  so  drastic  a  reform, 
but  opposition  vanishes  in  the  presence  of  this  ter- 
rible man  who,  with  all  his  inflexibility,  is  infinitely 
compassionate  and  persuasive,  and  whose  blameless 
life  silences  the  cavils  of  the  few  who  resist  his  magic 
spell.  Touched  by  his  transforming  eloquence  the 
forgotten  ideals  of  monk  and  Christian  have  again 
become  glorious  and  fire  the  imaginations  of  men. 
For  it  must  not  be  forgotten  that  Florence  is  still 
at  heart  profoundly  superstitious,  that  this  humanist 

53 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


culture  which  has  been  her  pride,  is  a  hothouse 
growth,  and  one  by  no  means  acclimated  to  the 
persistent  conditions  about  it;  finally,  that  the  long 
emphasis  upon  the  aesthetic  to  the  disparagement 
of  the  ethical  and  religious  has  prepared  men  for 
reaction,  while  new  and  strange  portents  are  appear- 
ing upon  the  political  horizon. 

In  these  conditions  the  mission  of  Savonarola  is 
as  fire  in  dry  stubble  when  the  wind  is  high.  The  age- 
long superstition  of  the  people  is  with  him  a  passion. 
He  believes  not  only  in  God  and  conscience,  but 
in  dreams  and  portents,  in  miracles  and  divine  in- 
tervention in  immediate  and  concrete  forms.  The 
vision  of  a  flaming  sword  is  a  prophesy  of  war  and 
disaster;  the  coming  of  the  French  king  is  no  polit- 
ical accident  but  a  divine  judgment.  To  the  noblest 
spirits  he  appeals  by  his  lofty  ideals  of  purity  and 
his  unflinching  self-abnegation,  while  to  the  base 
and  sordid  he  seems  to  promise  the  fulfillment  of 
vindictive  desires  and  the  gratifications  of  a  sensuous 
heaven.  The  great  image  is  part  of  gold  and  part  of 
iron  and  part  of  clay,  and  each  finds  in  it  after  his 
kind.  Savonarola  and  Lorenzo,  as  they  reach  out 
for  the  multitude,  have  much  more  in  common  than 
they  realize,  but  in  their  appeal  and  seeming  purpose 
they  are  the  most  absolute  of  irreconcilables. 
Savonarola,  ascetic,  narrow,  intense,  absolutely  be- 
lieving in  popular  government,  yet  unconscious  that 
his  power  to  manipulate  the  assembly  lies  at  the  root 
of  his  belief,  stands  for  conscience,  self-denial,  purity 

54 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


and  fervid  religious  faith.  Lorenzo,  refined,  subtle, 
calculating,  profoundly  distrustful  of  popular  judg- 
ments, and  trusting  in  the  discipline  and  shrewdness 
of  the  chosen  circle  of  which  he  is  the  master  spirit, 
stands  for  culture,  beauty,  subtlety,  and  intellect. 
The  cleverest  of  politicans  is  pitted  against  the  most 
uncompromising  of  prophets. 

Savonarola  has  from  the  first  numbered  many  of 
Lorenzo's  chosen  circle  among  his  listeners,  and  his 
sermons  are  the  subject  of  not  unsympathetic  dis- 
cussion at  the  table  of  the  Magnifico.  But  phil- 
osophic tolerance  can  not  blink  the  fact  that  his 
denunciation  of  the  existing  regime,  and  even  of 
the  Medici  by  name,  is  subversive  in  the  extreme. 
Lorenzo,  too  generous  as  well  as  too  subtle  to  play 
the  tyrant,  has  no  thought  of  silencing  his  antago- 
nist. But  he  is  none  the  less  alive  to  the  necessity 
of  warding  off  this  new  danger  to  Florence  and  to 
the  uncertain  Medicean  succession.  He  must  coun- 
teract what  he  may  not  check.  In  the  battle  of 
wits  and  of  personality  he  has  never  yet  been  worsted, 
and  the  battle  is  on.  We  recognize  the  first  skirmish 
in  the  eloquent  counter  preaching  in  San  Lorenzo 
where  the  divine  message  comes  clothed  in  all  the 
beauty  of  the  Renaissance.  A  year  ago  it  would 
have  packed  the  church  but  today  it  is  unheeded. 

The  case  is  serious  and  one  not  to  be  handled 
by  indirection.  The  master  will  try  his  hand.  Soon 
the  equanimity  of  San  Marco  is  upset  as  never 
before.  Breathless  with  excitement  the  monks  an- 

55 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


nounce  to  Savonarola:  "Lorenzo  is  in  the  Garden." 
"Has  he  inquired  for  me?"  "No."  "Well,  then 
don't  disturb  him  at  his  devotions !" 

Whatever  the  clever  move  that  the  far-seeing 
Lorenzo  may  have  planned,  however  sincere  may 
be  his  desire  to  reach  an  understanding  with  the 
stern  monk,  this  refusal  to  treat,  refusal  even  to 
meet,  makes  understanding  impossible.  We  await 
with  absorbing  interest  the  further  moves  of  the 
master  player. 

But  we  await  in  vain.  The  player  is  stricken 
and  the  feeble  frame  that  has  so  long  trammeled 
the  potent  spirit  has  at  last  refused  its  halting 
service.  Even  the  spell  of  the  great  preacher  is 
forgotten  as  Florence  awaits  in  awed  silence  the 
news  from  that  death-bed  at  Carreggi  where  the  soul 
of  a  great  age  is  passing.  And  the  news  has  come. 
Amplified  by  busy  rumor  and  perhaps  recast  in  the 
poetic  mold  of  myth,  that  final  scene  epitomizes  the 
great  conflict. 

Confronted  by  the  great  change  which  had  now 
declared  itself  imminent,  the  thoughts  of  the  dying 
man  were  disquieting  and  brought  reaction  of  spirit. 
There  were  haunting  spectral  visions  of  God  as  the 
great  avenger  of  wrong-doing  which,  in  this  moment, 
no  beauty  worship  could  lay.  The  deepening  sense 
of  disloyalty  and  the  need  of  reconciliation  came  to 
him  as  it  has  come  to  so  many  when  the  flames  of 
passion  have  died  out  and  conscience  sits  solitary 
among  the  embers. 

56 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


Then  the  monk,  who  alone  had  never  fawned  or 
flattered,  seemed  the  one  to  help  him  in  his  hour 
of  need.  Perhaps,  too,  there  was  the  consciousness 
of  the  struggle  which  he  was  bequeathing  to  his 
headstrong  son,  and  the  hope  that  the  monk  might 
find  in  reconciliation  with  himself  a  pathway 
to  reconciliation  with  his  house.  Men  seldom  act 
from  wholly  simple  motives,  and  even  in  death 
can  not  ignore  the  habits  that  have  ruled  their 
lives. 

Called  into  the  august  presence,  the  monk  asked 
wherefore  he  had  been  bidden.  "To  shrive  my 
soul,"  said  the  dying  man.  "That  I  will  do  on 
three  conditions."  "What  are  they?"  "First,  that 
you  believe  on  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  as  your  Savior." 
To  this  Lorenzo  gave  immediate  assent.  We  may 
question  whether  the  phrase  was  very  meaningful 
to  one  who  had  spent  a  lifetime  in  philosophic 
skepticism;  but  like  Savonarola,  we  can  hardly  do 
otherwise  than  take  him  at  his  word.  "And  the 
second  condition?"  "That  you  restore  all  monies 
illegally  taken  from  Florence."  Lorenzo  knew  what 
that  meant.  Savonarola  was  not  one  who  saw  in  the 
role  of  Medici  a  justification  for  the  income  they  had 
taken  from  the  state.  To  him,  as  the  Medicean  rule 
was  plain  usurpation,  so  the  Medicean  appropriation 
of  funds  was  plain  theft.  We  may  well  imagine 
how  the  feeble  pulse  quickened  as  Lorenzo  contem- 
plated the  bankruptcy  of  his  family  as  a  condition 
of  his  salvation.  But  if  so  heavy  a  price  could  insure 

57 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


his  soul's  peace,  and  possibly  the  immunity  of  his 
house  from  further  attack  by  this  implacable  foe,  it 
might  be  worth  the  sacrifice.  Long  was  the  pause 
and  very  different  the  assent  of  this  sorely  troubled 
spirit,  but  at  last  the  assent  was  given.  "Third," 
said  the  terrible  monk,  "you  must  give  back  to 
Florence  her  liberties."  This  time  there  was  no 
struggle,  no  hesitation.  Lorenzo  turned  his  face 
to  the  wall  and  died  unshriven. 

The  story  is  told  with  hushed  voice  and  the 
mingled  awe  and  sympathy  of  the  crowd  is  rarely 
broken  by  the  note  of  exultation.  Yet  it  is  impos- 
sible to  overlook  the  fact  that  the  monk  has  scored 
another  victory.  He  has  refused  to  shrive  the 
greatest  and  most  powerful  of  Florentines,  and 
Lorenzo  has  died  unshriven.  Vaguely  the  crowd 
see  in  the  encounter  the  triumph  of  uncompromising 
righteousness  over  stricken  and  despairing  sin. 

But  there  are  those  who  would  fain  see  in  this 
final  silence  another  meaning.  The  dying  lips  never 
gave  up  their  secret,  but  if  they  could  have  spoken, 
might  they  not  have  said  something  like  this:  "I 
accept  the  shadowy  faith  you  offer,  as  a  man  may  do 
who  has  spent  his  life  in  a  struggle  with  realities 
and  in  the  impartial  contemplation  of  speculative 
thought.  I  even  sacrifice  fortune  and  family  as 
atonement  for  wrongs  more  nominal  than  real.  I 
make  no  mention  of  services  that  might  seem  to 
justify  my  emoluments.  I  see  no  plain  case  of 
theft,  as  you  do,  monk;  but  the  title  is  not  clear  and 

58 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


conscience  shall  have  the  benefit  of  the  doubt,  even 
though  ruin  be  the  result.  Myself  I  sacrifice  and 
those  that  I  may  call  my  own. 

"  But  give  back  to  Florence  her  liberties !  Do  you 
know  what  that  means,  O  monk  ?  Are  you  unmindful 
of  the  passions  that  ran  riot  in  the  streets,  of  the 
war  of  factions,  the  chronic  feuds,  the  choas  in  in- 
dustry, in  government,  in  religion,  in  private  life? 
Was  it  for  naught  that  the  strong  arm  took  the  helm 
when  the  ship  was  sore  bested?  The  liberty  of 
Florentines;  what  is  it  but  the  privilege  of  anarchy, 
chaos  and  murder  ?  It  is  easy  for  you,  wrought  upon 
by  fastings  and  visions  in  the  night,  to  exhort  to 
righteousness  and  reform.  But  think  you  that  in  a 
lifetime  in  which  I  have  wrought  to  fashion  a  state 
from  crude  humanity  as  I  found  it,  I  have  had  no 
conscience,  no  thought  for  other's  weal  ?  You  would 
make  Florence  into  a  heaven ;  I  have  saved  Florence 
from  being  a  hell,  Take  the  price  of  my  doing,  just 
or  unjust,  but  not  the  thing  I  have  done.  Shrive 
me  not,  0  monk,  if  you  will  not.  I  appeal  unto 
God." 


The  practical  and  the  ideal;  between  these  two 
there  is  no  reconciliation,  save  in  the  finished  work 
which  their  common  effort  has  wrought.  In  this 
world  of  ours,  there  is  instant  need  that  something 
should  be  done  with  crude  men  and  imperfect  con- 
ditions. Somebody  must  take  men  as  they  are, 
appeal  to  them  with  arguments  that  they  can  under- 

59 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


stand,  organize  them  for  purposes  that  they  can 
grasp,  and  appreciate.  Selfish  and  coarse,  they  must 
be  gratified,  indulged,  wheedled  and  cajoled.  En- 
vious, petty,  and  dull,  they  must  be  managed  by 
hidden  forces  and  hoodwinked  into  well  doing.  End- 
less compromise,  patch  work,  and  inconsistency 
enter  into  every  working  plan.  There  is  much  that 
defies  the  simple  rules  of  right,  much  that  will  not 
bear  the  light,  much  that  grates  upon  our  sensi- 
bilities, in  the  workings  of  every  party,  every  busi- 
ness, every  church.  There  are  no  ideal  organiza- 
tions because  there  are  no  ideal  people  to  organize. 
He  who  would  be  a  doer  of  real  things  with  real  men 
must  be  a  practical  man ;  he  must  take  men  as  they 
are. 

But  while  we  must  take  men  as  they  are  it  must 
be  with  the  unfailing  purpose  of  making  them  what 
they  ought  to  be.  Take  them  as  they  are,  or  you 
will  not  take  them  at  all.  Make  them  what  they 
ought  to  be  or  they  are  not  worth  the  taking.  This 
is  the  never-ceasing  reminder  of  the  idealist,  to 
keep  in  sight  the  final  goal. 

Yet  it  is  the  fatality  of  human  nature  to  separate 
and  antagonize  these  two  functions,  either  of  which 
is  worthless  without  the  other.  The  practical  man 
who  takes  men  as  they  are,  adjusting  himself  to 
their  foibles  and  manipulating  them  for  his  ends, 
becomes  very  well  content  with  them  as  they  are. 
Broad  plans  for  human  regeneration  disturb  his 
working  program  and  put  him  out  of  his  reckonings. 

60 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


Insensibly  but  inevitably  he  becomes  an  obstacle 
to  reform  and  progress.  The  idealist  just  as  in- 
evitably falls  into  the  opposite  error.  Mistaking  the 
ultimate  ideal  for  a  working  program,  he  demands 
the  impossible  and  sacrifices  the  feasible  in  an  effort 
for  the  ideal.  In  the  social  order  he  demands 
absolute  democracy,  in  business,  conscious  altruism 
and  avowed  stewardship,  in  politics  only  philan- 
thropic organization  and  public-spirited,  self-denying 
service.  All  this  is  good,  but  it  is  not  a  working 
program.  If  by  impassioned  eloquence  majorities 
are  won  for  these  ideals,  they  melt  before  the  re- 
surging  tide  of  human  passion  as  the  morning  dew 
disappears  before  the  sun.  There  is  an  infinite 
pathos  in  that  solemn  vote  by  which  the  Florentine 
people,  under  the  leadership  of  the  great  idealist, 
at  a  regular  municipal  election,  chose  Jesus  Chirst 
for  their  king.  Might  not  the  most  devout  adherent 
of  the  older  order  have  smiled  at  the  simplicity  of 
these  children  of  the  ideal  ? 

And  so  the  great  struggle  continues  between  the 
men  of  the  moment  and  the  men  of  the  ideal.  Mis- 
understood, dreaded,  and  hated  of  each  other,  they 
are  none  the  less,  useful  only  in  cooperation.  Neither 
can  shrive  the  other's  soul.  Each  must  appeal 
unto  God. 


61 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


VII 

Since  the  death  of  Lorenzo,  all  eyes  are  turned 
upon  Savonarola.  There  have  been  happenings,  to 
be  sure,  in  the  great  palace  of  the  Medici,  which  at 
other  times  would  have  challenged  attention.  There 
has  been  the  same  delegation  of  responsible  citizens, 
the  same  grave  petition  to  the  youthful  heir,  and 
the  same  well-phrased  acceptance.  There  have  been 
grave  decisions,  too,  and  grave  mistakes,  alas,  which, 
added  to  the  monk's  denunciations,  have  exasperated 
the  people  and  sent  the  rash  Piero  into  exile.  But 
of  those  who  hurry  past  the  deserted  palace  to 
plain  San  Marco,  two  blocks  away,  or  later  to  the 
great  cathedral,  where  the  monk's  wonderful  voice 
swells  and  sobs  through  the  hollow  aisles,  there  are 
few  who  remember  and  less  who  regret  the  family 
whom  they  so  recently  delighted  to  honor.  The 
monk  is  regarded  with  the  most  varied  sentiments, 
but  all  unite  in  giving  him  the  homage  of  engrossing 
attention.  Almost  inevitably,  too,  attention  begets 
sympathy,  devotion,  adoration  in  degree  suited  to 
temperament.  As  these  few  brief  years  have  con- 
firmed his  power,  there  are  few  who  have  resisted 
his  spell.  The  opposition  may  say  as  of  old :  Behold 
how  ye  prevail  nothing.  Lo,  the  world  is  gone  after 
him. 

62 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


Inquiry  discloses  nothing  very  startling  in  his 
earlier  career.  His  parentage  embodied  the  in- 
herent contradictions  of  the  Renaissance,  the  essence 
of  that  conflict  in  which  he  is  playing  so  conspicuous 
a  part.  His  father  is  remembered  as  a  polished  man 
of  the  world,  one  in  whom  religious  conformity 
was  perfunctory,  an  attitude  of  urbanity  and  good 
breeding  toward  honored  convention,  for  the  skep- 
ticism of  the  Renaissance  is  seldom  militant.  Con- 
formity became  easier  as  the  church  grew  more 
complacent  and  less  inclined  to  press  its  more  irk- 
some claims.  A  true  humanist,  all  views  and  all 
principles  had  for  him  an  academic  interest,  and 
none  of  them  the  force  of  conviction.  To  his  tolerant 
and  catholic  spirit  the  harsh  antithesis  between  duty 
and  pleasure  was  one  of  the  interesting  austerities 
of  an  earlier  ascetic  age.  Yet  humanism  does  not 
deal  wholly  in  negatives,  and  he  found  in  the  cult 
of  beauty,  taste,  and  learning,  and  in  the  refined 
pursuit  of  pleasure  things  worth  living  for.  •  .'.'•' 

To  the  mother  this  was  the  great  void.  In  refine- 
ment and  sensitiveness  she  was  more  than  her 
husband's  equal,  but  there  seems  to  have  been  no 
place  in  her  nature  for  the  easy  going  indifference 
which  was  the  keynote  of  his  character.  Devotion 
was  with  her  a  passion.  Whatever  her  intellectual 
abilities,  she  seems  to  have  felt  no  inclination  to  use 
them  to  dissect  that  which  she  loved.  The  imperious 
need  of  a  God  to  worship  and  of  a  ritual  language  for 
the  expressions  of  the  emotions  of  her  heart  de- 

63 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


stroyed  all  impulse  to  make  these  the  subject  of 
analysis  and  inquiry.  Above  all  she  recoiled  before 
lust  and  unhallowed  pleasure  in  every  form,  and  no 
decorum  or  disguise  of  decency  reconciled  her  to 
its  inherent  ugliness. 

What  may  have  been  the  relations  between  these 
two  life  partners  and  what  the  relation  of  each  to 
the  son  we  can  only  imagine.  Such  contrasts  are 
common  in  these  closest  relations,  and  they  by  no 
means  preclude  tender  affection  and  permanent  de- 
votion. If  the  husband  was  true  to  the  spirit  of 
that  culture  which  he  accepted,  he  was  tolerant  of 
his  wife's  peculiarities  and  did  not  needlessly  wound 
her  by  his  conduct  or  his  views.  The  wife  had  a 
much  older  warrant  for  fidelity  and  devotion.  That 
each  loved  the  son  and  sought  in  him  the  fulfill- 
ment of  their  hopes  may  be  taken  for  granted.  It 
is  a  matter  of  interesting  appeal  to  the  imagination 
what  must  have  been  the  sentiments  of  this  father 
when  the  son  that  he  had  destined  for  his  own  career 
of  the  law  and  his  own  place  in  the  brilliant  life  of 
the  day,  suddenly  and  without  his  knowledge  or 
consent  took  the  vows  of  a  monk.  If  death  had 
blasted  his  hopes,  he  would  have  had  our  sympathy. 
How  much  more  when  the  son  not  only  failed  him 
but  repudiated  and  discredited  his  lifelong  ideals. 
Even  the  mother  may  have  questioned  the  wisdom 
of  a  step  which,  though  much  in  the  line  of  her 
sympathies,  was  at  variance  with  her  family  loyalty. 

The  early  years  of  Savonarola's  life  have  been 
64 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


such  as  are  called  uneventful  by  observers  who  are 
unmindful  of  spiritual  happenings.  They  have  been 
years  of  preparation,  yet  preparation  for  an  unknown 
future  and  one  which  he  has  hardly  foreseen.  They 
have  been  years  of  self -discipline,  of  ascetic  devotion, 
and  of  apocalyptic  exercise  of  a  highly  excitable 
imagination.  He  has  joined  a  preaching  order,  but 
one  whose  original  purpose  has  long  been  in  abeyance, 
and  he  seems  at  first  to  have  had  no  idea  of  his 
powers.  These,  indeed,  were  not  manifest  in  his 
early  efforts.  His  extreme  sensitiveness  is  even  yet 
an  obstacle  which  he  overcomes  only  by  the  most 
intense  self-assertion. 

But  Savonarola  has  other  abilities  than  those  of 
the  orator  and  abilities  that  were  earlier  manifest. 
He  is  a  born  leader  of  men,  gifted  with  rare  penetra- 
tion into  character  and  motive  and  with  the  power 
to  inspire  equally  love  and  fear.  He  possesses  the 
rare  faculty  of  speaking  in  the  imperative  mode 
without  shouting,  and  the  gift,  almost  equally  rare, 
of  absolute  decision.  It  is  a  testimony  to  the  large 
appreciation  of  ability  always  shown  by  the  mar- 
velous Roman  Catholic  organization,  that  in  this 
humanist  age  when  the  ideals  of  Savonarola  com- 
mand so  little  sympathy,  he  should  have  been 
jadvanced  so  rapidly  to  positions  of  leadership  and 
power. 

The  death  of  Lorenzo,  followed  so  soon  by  the 
collapse  of  his  feeble  successor,  has  left  Savonarola 
the  master  of  Florence.  The  position  is  one  which 

65 


rA  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


he  seems  not  to  have  sought  and  which  it  is  doubtful 
if  he  even  yet  realizes.  He  has  from  the  first 
espoused  the  cause  of  popular  government  and  in- 
sisted upon  the  restoration  of  its  machinery  which, 
under  the  Medici,  had  quietly  ceased  to  function. 
He  seems  to  believe  absolutely  in  the  right  and  the 
ability  of  the  people  to  determine  their  own  govern- 
ment, but  he  noticeably  attaches  the  greatest  im- 
portance to  their  spiritual  guidance  in  the  perform- 
ance of  these  functions,  a  fact  which  leads  some  to 
assert  that  his  faith  in  the  people  is  only  a  disguised 
faith  in  himself.  Perhaps  this  faith  is  common  to 
men  who  have  large  power  of  swaying  others,  and 
common,  too,  an  element  of  unconsciousness  and 
self-deception. 

Savonarola,  therefore,  has  bent  all  energies  to  the 
restoration  of  the  popular  government  and  the 
elaboration  of  its  machinery.  A  great  council  now 
deliberates  on  legislative  measures — not  a  little 
assisted  by  pronouncements  from  the  pulpit  of  the 
Duomo — and  a  smaller  body  is  charged  with  the 
duties  of  administration. 

It  is  but  fair  to  say  that  this  government  seems 
to  be  giving  a  good  account  of  itself.  We  can  hardly 
wonder  that  those  experienced  in  government  affairs 
should  have  contemplated  with  anxiety,  almost  with 
dismay,  this  accession  to  power  of  a  people  now  for 
nearly  a  century  without  experience.  Nor  was  the 
denunciatory  preaching  of  the  monk  whose  ascend- 
ency was  now  inevitable,  calculated  to  reassure  them. 

66 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


There  was  ground  to  fear  a  rule  of  fanatics,  and  a 
policy  of  violence  and  reprisal.  These  men,  how- 
ever, if  not  wholly  reassured,  confess  that  their 
worst  fears  have  not  been  realized.  The  personnel 
of  the  government,  while  sympathetic  toward  the 
monk  and  favoring  his  program  of  reform,  is  for  the 
most  part  sane,  and  the  soberer  elements  are  in  the 
ascendant.  There  are  those  who  are  sanguine  enough 
to  suggest  that  Piero  Soderini,  if  he  can  hold  things 
steady  until  extravagance  has  spent  its  force,  perhaps 
until  the  monk  has  disappeared,  may  give  to 
Florence  an  admirable  government. 

But  even  the  monk  has  shown  remarkable  re- 
straint in  connections  where  trouble  was  expected. 
He  has  stood  like  a  rock  against  all  vindictive  pro- 
posals on  the  part  of  the  malcontents  who  have  been 
attracted  by  his  unsparing  denunciations,  and  now 
the  Mediceans  themselves  look  to  him  for  protection. 
To  the  Medicean,  accustomed  to  compromise  and 
payment  for  services  rendered,  nothing  is  so  re- 
markable about  Savonarola  as  his  stern  opposition 
to  the  rapacity  and  vindictiveness  of  those  who  have 
helped  raise  him  to  power. 

But  if  Savonarola  shows  mercy  toward  his  fallen 
adversaries,  he  shows  none  toward  the  vices  that 
they  tolerated  or  the  ideals  they  entertained.  The 
aim  of  life  is  not  beauty  or  pleasure,  but  righteousness 
and  harmony  with  the  divine  will.  Compared  with 
these  great  ends,  how  trivial  is  the  round  of  ephemeral 
pleasures  on  which  our  starveling  humanity  subsists. 
67 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


Savonarola  does  not  forget  that  this  establish- 
ment of  the  reign  of  righteousness  must  begin  with 
the  regeneration  of  the  individual.  For  this  purpose 
he  uses  those  spiritual  forces  which  in  all  ages  have 
been  recognized  as  legitimate  in  the  service  of  re- 
ligion, fervent  exhortation  with  appeals  to  divine 
compassion  and  divine  retribution,  the  whole  en- 
forced by  the  example  of  devotion  and  a  blameless 
life.  No  man  has  ever  surpassed  Savonarola  in  the 
power  of  this  appeal.  There  are  those  who  criticize 
his  appeal  to  the  lower  motives  and  still  more  who 
judge  him  extreme  in  his  condemnation  of  vanities 
and  innocent  pleasures.  There  are  even  those  who 
see  a  fault  in  his  unmeasured  appeal  to  the  higher 
impulses.  Inspired  by  his  example  and  carried  away 
by  his  hypnotic  power,  men  are  led  on  to  heights 
of  self-renunciation  and  to  an  ultra  purification  of 
life  which  neither  their  own  powers  nor  even  his 
continued  influence  will  enable  them  to  maintain. 
The  Medicean  temperament  instinctively  feels  that 
the  reformer  who  overstrains  human  nature,  like  the 
builder  who  overstrains  his  beams  and  girders,  will 
see  his  work  go  down  in  collapse. 

But  for  the  moment,  Florentine  nature,  reinforced 
by  his  wonderful  example  and  his  ever  repeated 
appeal,  still  stands  the  strain.  It  is  wonderful  to 
what  an  extent  private  life  has  been  transformed. 
Not  only  the  unsightly  vices  but  even  the  frivolities 
and  vanities  of  life  have  been  put  away.  Mis- 
chievous instincts  that  can  not  be  wholly  repressed 

68 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


are  even  harnessed  to  the  work  of  regeneration,  as 
witness  these  boys  who,  not  long  since,  went  about 
in  white  robes  and  with  well  conned  phrases  of  the 
new  order,  claimed  the  false  hair,  the  ribbons,  and 
the  rouge  pots  for  the  great  bonfire  in  the  piazza. 
What  a  chance  for  a  boy ! 

But  we  must  not  judge  this  work  of  personal 
regeneration  by  picturesque  incidents  like  this.  It 
is  agreed  on  all  hands  that  the  change  is  far-reaching 
and  profound.  Savonarola  and  his  following  are 
charged,  not  with  levity  or  even  with  hypocrisy, 
but  with  excess  of  zeal.  Nor  is  his  following  one 
of  weaklings  and  women.  It  includes  level  heads 
like  Soderini,  and  despite  his  hostility  to  art,  not 
only  serious  spirits  like  Fra  Bartolommeo,  but 
Sandro  Botticelli,  and  the  taciturn  Michelangelo 
are  among  his  devoted  adherents. 

But  Savonarola  is  nowise  minded  to  stop  with  his 
work  of  personal  regeneration.  He  is  sagacious 
enough  to  perceive  that  men  are  very  much  the 
creatures  of  that  social  organization  which  they  have 
themselves  created.  Individual  reforms  count  for 
little  until  they  are  intrenched  in  a  reformed  society. 
For  the  children  of  God,  there  must  be  a  kingdom 
of  God. 

From  the  first,  therefore,  Savonarola  has  launched 
his  attack  against  iniquities  in  state  and  church.  His 
prepossession  in  favor  of  popular  government  insured 
his  uncompromising  opposition  to  the  Medicean 
regime,  even  had  their  administration  been  fault- 

69 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


less,  for  to  his  mind  that  regime  was  iniquitous  in 
principle.  It  is  interesting  to  speculate  as  to  what 
would  have  been  the  result  if  this  collision  had 
occurred  when  the  Medicean  power  was  at  its  height 
under  Cosimo  or  in  Lorenzo's  prime.  But  fate  has 
willed  that  that  power  should  collapse  at  the  moment 
of  Savonarola's  attack,  thus  leaving  the  ground  clear 
for  the  great  experiment. 

Success  seems  to  have  crowned  the  undertaking. 
The  popular  government  has  been  established  and 
able  and  earnest  men  have  been  found  for  its  service. 
The  drastic  reform  of  private  life  has  been  followed 
by  a  like  reform  of  the  state.  If  this  reform  seems 
extreme  as  judged  by  prevailing  standards,  it  fairly 
represents  the  new  standards  of  Florentine  private 
life  and  the  will  of  the  people.  Given  the  new  ideals 
which  unquestionably  dominate  Florence,  it  is  diffi- 
cult to  criticise  the  measures  adopted  or  the  means 
chosen  for  their  enforcement. 

But  there  are  ominous  signs  that  the  movement 
has  reached  its  limits  and  that  a  tragic  change  is 
impending.  The  initial  impulse  seems  to  have  spent 
its  force  and  the  opposition  is  becoming  more  re- 
doubtable. 

There  is  the  Medicean  party.  The  family  is  gone, 
but  their  party,  the  party  of  big  business  and  of 
practical  politics,  is  here  and  irreconcilable.  Not 
that  all  are  seekers  after  place  and  privilege.  There 
are  many  high  minded  and  disinterested  men  among 
them,  men  who  sympathize  with  the  soberer  part 

70 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


of  Savonarola's  program  and  are  grateful  for  the 
protection  which  his  powerful  influence  has  ac- 
corded them.  But  these  men  see  in  Savonarola  the 
only  safeguard  against  the  excesses  and  the  vagaries 
of  popular  government,  and  this  safeguard,  in  the 
nature  of  the  case,  can  not  be  permanent.  Without 
him  what  would  the  mob  have  done  on  the  morrow 
of  Piero's  departure  ?  What  will  the  mob  do  on  the 
morrow  of  Savonarola's  disappearance?  Savonarola 
will  have  no  successor,  and  the  mood  of  spiritual 
exaltation  which  his  magic  has  created  will  not 
be  self -perpetuating.  Patriotism  quite  as  much  as 
selfishness  prompts  them  to  seize  the  reins  and  fore- 
stall a  perilous  interregnum. 

More  redoubtable  is  the  hostility  of  the  church.  It 
is  true  that  the  church  has  always  done  lip  service 
to  Savonarola's  ideals.  It  is  from  the  church,  indeed, 
that  Savonarola's  entire  program  is  taken.  Even 
his  methods  are  such  as  have  long  enjoyed  its  sanc- 
tion. Monk  and  prelate  have  no  such  reason  for 
opposition  as  have  the  Medici,  men  of  secular  aims 
and  worldly  methods.  But  monk  and  prelate  have 
found  reasons,  nevertheless,  and  their  opposition  is 
instinctive  and  uncompromising.  There  are  the 
Franciscans,  for  instance,  in  their  great  stronghold 
of  Santa  Croce.  Who  that  knows  them  can  expect 
them  to  regard  complacently  this  immense  increase 
of  Dominican  influence?  And  who  would  hope  that 
an  archbishop,  one  appointed  by  the  pope  who  tried 
to  assassinate  Lorenzo,  would  submit  tamely  to  the 

71 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


absolute  domination  of  his  diocese  by  a  belligerent 
monk?  We  need  not  lay  too  much  stress  upon  the 
certainly  low  standards  of  church  morality  at  this 
time  to  understand  that  conflict  with  reforming  zeal 
is  inevitable.  Here  too  the  opposition  is  not  entirely 
selfish  or  base.  Fear  of  the  zealot  is  instinctive  in 
all  established  organizations.  The  zealot  is  after  all 
a  disturber  of  the  peace,  and  he  takes  a  large  contract 
when  he  engages  that  the  good  accomplished  shall 
outweigh  the  harm. 

Church  and  monastery  are  outside  the  pale  of 
Savonarola's  reforming  legislation.  They  are  not 
answerable  to  the  local  authorities,  but  only  to  Rome. 
Against  their  passive  resistance  persuasion  and  legis- 
lation are  alike  impotent.  Nothing  daunted,  the 
intrepid  monk  launches  his  denunciations  against 
monk  and  prelate,  against  even  the  pope  himself. 
Ever  seeking  practical  means  to  accomplish  prac- 
tical ends,  he  has  written  to  the  princes  of  Italy 
urging  them  to  call  a  church  council  and  depose  a 
pope  who  bought  his  election. 

It  is  all  very  logical,  but  all  very  desperate.  The 
sanest  of  Savonarola's  supporters  can  not  help  asking 
what  is  to  be  expected  from  a  pope  under  such 
circumstances,  especially  from  such  a  pope  as  Alex- 
ander Borgia.  And  what  is  to  be  hoped  from  the 
princes  of  Italy,  men  schooled  in  the  prevailing  polit- 
ical ethics  and  well  informed  as  to  the  conditions 
which  would  govern  a  new  papal  election?  If  the 
Frate  could  preach  to  them,  perhaps;  but  can  he 

72 


A  ELORENTINE  REVERY 


arouse  their  consciousness  by  a  diplomatic  note? 
These  thoughts  are  not  reassuring,  and  those  who 
know  pope  Borgia  do  not  expect  him  to  be  restrained 
by  prudence  or  scruple.  Savonarola  is  treading  the 
way  to  the  scaffold. 

But  there  is  a  greater  danger  and  a  deeper  tragedy. 
Savonarola  himself  has  changed.  Outwardly  he  is 
the  same.  There  is  the  same  blameless  private  life, 
the  same  devotion  to  the  cause  of  humanity,  and 
the  same  intrepidity  of  spirit.  But  in  the  heroic 
struggle  of  these  six  years,  Savonarola  has  found 
himself  in  the  grip  of  practical  realities.  That  un- 
swerving loyalty  to  principle  which  he  had  demanded 
so  uncompromisingly  in  those  early  Medicean  days 
has  proved  impracticable  even  under  his  all-powerful 
guidance.  Hampered  by  a  multitude  of  private 
interests,  prejudices,  and  antipathies  which  no  pulpit 
appeal  could  dispel,  he  has  learned  to  wink  at  much 
which  he  once  condemned  and  to  choose  the  lesser 
evil.  Threatened  by  faction  and  imperiled  by 
opposition,  his  government  has  had  to  maintain  a 
majority  by  complaisance  and  conciliation.  A  dis- 
creet silence  has  become  necessary  under  circum- 
stances where  once  the  prophet  would  have  spoken. 
Worse  still,  emergencies  have  arisen  in  which  laws 
he  had  demanded  for  the  protection  of  the  individual 
against  arbitrary  power  have  had  to  be  set  aside. 
It  simply  had  to  be.  Either  the  law  must  go  for  the 
moment,  or  the  Medici  would  return  and  the  law 
would  go  altogether.  What  friend  of  the  Republic 

73 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


could  hesitate  before  such  an  alternative?  Yet  what 
would  he  have  said — nay,  what  did  he  say — six  years 
ago,  when  the  Medici  did  this  very  thing?  Savon- 
arola is  far  too  keen  and  far  too  candid  not  to  be 
conscious  of  this  inconsistency.  Yet  he  is  too  prac- 
tical to  throw  away  so  much  of  substantial  achieve- 
ment for  reasons  which  even  his  most  sympathetic 
advisers  must  regard  as  inadequate.  No,  he  will 
prefer  the  lesser  to  the  greater  sacrifice.  Insensibly 
but  remorselessly  the  exigencies  of  practical  affairs 
have  brought  the  prophet  to  his  knees  and  he  has 
bowed  to  the  god  of  the  Medici,  compromise. 

In  vain  he  strives  to  avoid,  to  disguise,  to  forget 
the  tragic  surrender.  He  urges  that  he  is  but  a 
private  citizen  and  that  it  is  for  the  official  guardians 
of  the  state  to  decide,  but  he  recalls  that  he  has 
habitually  influenced  and  can  still  influence  their 
decision.  Yes,  but  the  reasons  of  expediency  on 
which  their  decision  is  based  are  compelling.  Alas, 
how  often  he  has  denounced  this  Medicean  phil- 
osophy, and  declared  that  governments  based  upon 
expediency  were  an  abomination  unto  the  Lord! 
But  is  the  comparison  fair?  Is  emergency  action  to 
be  compared  with  habitual  action?  Is  it  not  one 
thing  to  set  aside  the  law  in  the  interest  of  righteous- 
ness, and  quite  another  to  set  it  aside  in  behalf  of 
private  or  party  advantage?  Sophistries,  all;  he 
half  realizes  it;  but  sophistries  that  do  him  honor. 

But  regardless  of  reasoning  and  anguish  of  spirit 
there  stands  necessity,  pitiless,  inexorable.  These 

74 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


concessions  must  be  made;  Florence  must  be  saved; 
the  kingdom  of  righteousness  must  prevail. 

Alas  that  redemption  must  be  purchased  at  so 
heavy  a  price!  Is  it  not  enough  that  the  redeemer 
should  be  crucified  in  the  flesh?  Must  he  also  be 
tortured  in  conscience  and  crucified  in  the  spirit? 
Has  any  man  known  real  martyrdom  until  God  has 
forsaken  him? 

These  experiences  have  had  their  inevitable  in- 
fluence upon  Savonarola's  preaching.  The  heedless 
listener  may  hear  the  same  wondrous  voice,  the  same 
lofty  appeal  to  purity  and  self-abnegation.  But  to 
those  more  subtly  attuned  there  is  a  loss  of  the  old 
assurance.  If  the  eternal  verities  are  asserted  with 
the  same  old  confidence,  their  local  application  is 
less  frequent  and  positive.  There  are  things  ques- 
tionable to  the  simple  minded  concerning  which  he 
is  silent,  even  apologetic. 

There  is  darkness  over  the  land  in  these  hours  of 
the  great  tragedy.  It  is  no  peril  of  foreign  invasion 
or  burden  of  private  trouble  that  turns  all  eyes 
toward  the  oracle.  The  faithful  have  loved  long  and 
deeply,  and  their  solicitude  in  this  dark  hour  is  for 
the  object  of  their  devotion.  The  sole  demand  of 
love  is  the  rehabilitation  of  the  prophet.  Surely  he 
understands,  and  he  will  not  leave  them  in  darkness. 
Oh  for  one  more  message,  one  more  clear  utterance 
with  the  old-time  assurance  of  one  who  has  stood  in 
the  presence  of  the  Eternal. 

The  message  has  come,  the  saddest  ever  wrung 
75 


A  FLORENTINE  REVERY 


from  a  soul  whose  supreme  effort  had  been  to  win 
a  world  to  God  and  to  righteousness.  "Brethren, 
pray  for  me,  for  God  hath  removed  from  me  the 
spirit  of  phophecy." 


To  those  who  sit  among  the  stars  and  view  from 
afar  the  turmoil  of  life,  the  movement  reveals  itself 
in  broad  and  simple  lines.  The  vast  complex  re- 
solves itself  into  a  few  primal  forces  governed  by 
clearly  discernible  principles.  How  easy  from  this 
vantage  point  to  chart  the  course  of  life!  How 
inspiring  the  confidence  born  of  this  privileged 
vision ! 

Within  the  turmoil  this  simplicity  disappears. 
The  primal  forces,  deflected  by  all  manner  of  obsta- 
cles, complicated  and  overborne  by  counter  forces 
are  but  intermittently  discernible,  often  seemingly 
in  abeyance.  In  this  perplexing  struggle  with  the 
local  and  the  temporary,  how  inadequate,  how  posi- 
tively misleading,  even,  is  this  prophet's  chart  of 
the  eternal  verities!  When  every  hour  some  un- 
charted reef  may  bring  disaster,  what  use  to  relax 
our  vigilance  in  contemplating  its  unpractical  gener- 
alities! The  vision  fades  and  a  narrow-horizoned 
opportunism  becomes  the  rule  of  life.  Yet  to  those 
who  have  once  sat  at  the  foot  of  God's  throne  and 
beheld  the  course  of  man's  destiny  stretch  plain  and 
straight  toward  its  shining  goal,  there  is  no  sacrifice 
like  the  loss  of  that  vision. 


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